


Sweet Home... Minnesota?

by Helena_Hathaway



Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe - Small Town, Bi-Curiosity, Confusion, Depression, Eventual Happy Ending, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Minnesota, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Returning Home, Sad with a Happy Ending, Sexuality Crisis, Small Towns, Trigger Warning for Alcoholism, Trigger warning for Bipolar/Depression
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-03
Updated: 2014-11-09
Packaged: 2018-01-18 00:30:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 27,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1408333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Helena_Hathaway/pseuds/Helena_Hathaway
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Recently dumped Gerard makes the decision to head back home for a little while. The reason he left his hometown though is because he’s just not suited for small town life. There’s nothing there for him, but he’s run out of choices. It’s not that the people aren’t nice, it’s just that they’re all suffocating. Apparently there’s a new guy living in town, which is practically unheard of. Everyone seems to like the new resident, Frank, but Gerard can’t think of a single reason why anyone would move to middle-of-nowhere Monroe. Despite the peculiar choice, Frank is there, and he’s there to stay.</p><p>The only problem now is the fact that Gerard is straight, but he’s falling for a guy. The new guy to be specific.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Destination: Monroe

**Author's Note:**

> This work is inspired by my want for a fanfic in my home state, where I know what I’m doing. I made up the main town though, because I wanted it to have the right layout for my brain. I don’t know where this story is going and I’m not going to update this every day like with my last fic, so I don’t have a ballpark estimation. I hope it’ll be good though.

I’m not keen about going back home. There was a reason I left and that reason was a good one. That place was toxic to me, that whole town was just bad. It wasn’t right for me, we didn’t suit each other. We still don’t suit each other. I’m built for big city life, and heavy traffic, street musicians! I’m not a four mile radius with one school and a Walmart person.

They told me I had to take a break though. ‘They’ being my family. I do need a break, but I really would prefer if that break were spent somewhere nice like the Bahamas or Italy, not the middle of nowhere in Minnesota.

I just got fired. My rent was also due and I couldn’t pay my half without the money from my job which I no longer had. There wasn’t anywhere else to go, and I made the mistake of telling my brother about it. Stupid Mikey for being all pushy and insistent. 

It also doesn’t help that I’m completely unstable after my breakup. I really thought we were good, she didn’t even hint about it, but here I am, in the small seat of a landing plane. No girlfriend, no job, no ambition. Isn’t life dandy. 

Minneapolis spreads out below me as we approach the ground and I watch the dark night sky get lighter as we reach the city lights. I don’t mind this city, at least it’s got a population. Downtown is fine. Dirty, disgusting, smoke filled, alcohol stained, and cramped: just the way I like it. 

Time passes quickly and I barely realize we’ve landed, but then I hear the lady beside me moving around and I turn to see a whole bunch of people in the aisles. I’m in the window seat so I have to wait a while until I can move, and when I do, I grab my small carry on from the overhead than walk quickly out of there.

The airport is quiet, because it’s so late, but I’m not bothered by it considering I’m usually up this late. It’s not even midnight for god’s sake. I walk past a few stores that already have the metal chain fence covering them to signal that they’re closed. Other places are just settling down for the day, and I’m one of many people walking down the endless corridor. I watch the baggage claim signs streak past above me as I walk, but I don’t take any notice of them. I’m just following the people around me, because we’re all headed the same place.

Down one escalator and then another and then through another endless hallway, across an automated sidewalk and several twists and turns. I finally walk into an unnaturally large room. There’s at least 30 circular conveyor belts all lined up next to each other, and somehow I got lucky because the one with my plane’s bags is only the third one down.

Ten minutes and the bags finally start spitting out and into their little rotation. I watch a tired looking mom grab a bright pink one for her daughter and a few more, until mine comes swinging out quickly. I only have one, because she took everything else. I want to hate her, but I still love her. Love is shit.

I grab the dark black bag and make my way back through the entrance I came from to find the next escalator down, which takes me underneath the airport. The security people give me halfhearted waves as I walk through the doors, and make my way to the set of stairs and then down a second set of stairs into the large cavernous room. I don’t know what it is about this room, but it’s really comforting to me. It’s weird, because there’s no reason for it to be calming, but it is. 

There’s two tunnels on either side of the wall for the incoming trains, and a large island like structure down the middle. The whole room is dark because the lights aren’t very strong, and we’re nowhere near the actual sun right now. There are a few other people around me, all waiting for the train with me, but I quickly buy my ticket and wait near the middle. The trains are always slower at this time of the night. Generally every 60 minutes rather than every 10. It comes along though, not too lengthy a wait, and I lazily get into the small little compartment.

Most of the seats are vacant because no one ever gets on around here except the people on this particular stop. Everyone gets off before now, because no one likes being on the train after a plane has just come in. The train runs through the two terminals, all day, and stops running the entire length of the blue line after midnight but I got here soon enough.

The train pushes off and Humphrey terminal flashes away behind me. A few jolts as we speed along the underground tunnel and I barely notice when we get outside because the sky is so dark. One stop, a person gets off, and I stay put. Two stops and a few people get off. Three stops and not a soul moves an inch. I still wonder what the purpose of this stop is, because no one ever uses it. Another stop and a few more people get off and one guy gets on, the poor bastard. Finally the train stops one last time at the mall.

The biggest mall in America. I like the Mall of America for some reason. It’s always busy and there’s always annoying tourists who seem alarmed by not one, but two food courts, and then there’s the ear splitting echoes of the theme park in the center, but it’s nice. The hub in the middle where they have concerts and events is great. I’ve never gotten to see a concert at the mall but its huge, and a lot of the time easy to sneak into. They can’t exactly prevent people from watching up on the other floors.

I don’t walk into the mall of course, because most, if not all the stores close at 9, except for the Hooters on the fourth floor.

I just get on the next bus that’s going where I need it to go, and I watch the city quietly fly away from me. I barely pay attention to what’s going on but I get off at my stop a few minutes later in the heart of suburbia. I don’t like or dislike suburbia to be frank, because it’s better than nowhere, but worse than somewhere. I know my way around this little town pretty well though, so I get off right next to the movie theater, then make my way past the Red Robin and down towards the more residential area.

An old friend of mine, who escaped the shithole we grew up in, agreed to sell me his old car, but he’s about a mile away from the nearest bus station so I make my way to his house. It’s not an overly nice car, older than me even, but he gave me a good price and I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to sell it before I leave which will hopefully be soon, but I need transport or I’ll literally die in this place out of pure boredom. I find my phone and dial his number.

“Hey Gerard, did you just get in?” he says, his name is Riley.

“I’m on my way to your house now, actually,” I answer, “I was dangerously close to missing the last train.”

“Oh, okay well I’ll see you soon, where are you?”

I tell him and I’m really close at this point just a few streets over so I hurry up so that I can rest my legs for a while.

“Hey man!” Riley says as I near him. I hadn’t planned on their being so many damn mosquitoes because I’d almost forgotten the worst thing about Minnesota summers. The state bird, but not really, mosquitoes.

He’s opened up his garage to unveil the 1979 Trans Am that was possibly a solid color at some point in its life but the paint is now far too chipped off or faded to tell.

“Here’s your shit of a car,” Riley says, and I nod in agreement.

“Well thanks anyway,” I say, accepting the keys from him.

“You sure you don’t want to stay the night man?” he asks. Riley is married with a kid and I honestly don’t want to be around someone who’s in love right now so I say no respectfully.

“You’ve got a long night ahead of you then. Monroe is at least a five hour drive.”

“I’ll manage, I like night better anyway.”

“Suit yourself,” Riley says with a shrug, and he looks just as annoyed by the mosquitoes as I am, “say hi to Mikey for me.”

“Will do,” I say and shake his hand because I’m kind of sweaty and I’m not much of a hugger anyway, “have a good night.”

I walk over to the car and get in quickly not wanting to stick around. I pull out of his garage without another word, and set off down the street. 

Monroe here I come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also I'm not going to continue this unless you ask me to. Just my way of saying: "I won't write if you're not going to read and review."


	2. Objective: Sleep

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Um, Mikey is introduced?

The minute I get onto the adjacent street I check the radio to see that it mercifully works. I also check my watch to see that it’s nearing one in the morning. My bags, which I’d put in the passenger’s seat don’t have any food or anything so I drive a little way down the road until I find a Walmart. After a quick trip to the bathroom, the snack aisle and the back of the store, I’m done and head off. I grabbed an iPod jack as well because there is no way I’ll survive an entire trip listening to the radio.

As soon as I hit the highway I blast the music on, and make an idiot of myself by singing along. Who cares though? I’m all alone in here.

Despite my determination to get on the road tonight, I’m still pretty tired, and it hits me sometime around two in the morning. I’m forced to stop at a bunch of gas stations for coffee, and the amount of liquid also means I have to pee a bunch.

At long last, sometime while the sun is just rising in the sky, I see the green sign that says Monroe is a little under ten miles away. I groan but keep driving until I see the semblance of a small town looming in front of me.

I’m not actually sure how big the city is, but its compact so that most of it is all in one place. A lot of towns are stretched out so that they’re like a big line, but Monroe is just a big blob. The population is somewhere around 7,000 people which sounds like a lot, but it really isn’t. In Minnesota the average population of suburbia is around 40,000 and big city life is somewhere around 400,000 so yeah Monroe is a small town.

It’s still early enough that a lot of people aren’t awake yet, but I see a few people who are up and about already. Another thing about small towns is that everyone knows what car everyone drives so of course they notice my dinged up Trans Am the instant it crosses the city line, and a few nosy people peer into my car and then wave when they see who’s driving. Most of these people have known me since I was an infant, and the only people who haven’t known me that long are people who are younger than me.

The town has a sizable downtown area for its size, but that’s mostly because our sister town, a few miles away, is much smaller than ours. They have almost nothing and depend on our town. Mostly it’s residential though, but there’s enough of a downtown to employ the population.

I see my brother’s house, which is on the edge of the west side of town and I sigh before pulling out in front of the disheveled looking lawn.

“GERARD!” A voice says, and I see my younger brother running excitedly out of the house. He looks so young still, if I hadn’t grown up with the guy then there would be no way for me to know he was almost 25.

“Hey Mikey, I’m kind of sweaty so you might not want-,“ too late, Mikey wraps his arms around me tightly.

“I’ve missed you so much bro,” Mikey says, and he pulls away to look at me. It’s already been two years because I didn’t come home for the last two Christmases. I was busy though.

“Yeah sorry, good to see you,” I say and he steps back to give me a onceover.

“You look exhausted man, did you drive all night?” Mikey says trying not to be blunt.

“Yeah, and my flight was like five hours so I feel like a walking bacteria swarm.”

“Oh god, come in then,” Mikey says and he grabs my hand to pull me into the house. It’s not the house I grew up in of course, that’s on the other side of town, but I kind of preferred staying with my brother than my parents. There’s a little less embarrassment in that. Well it’s still awkward to stay at your brother’s house, but at least Mikey isn’t as judgmental.

I’ve walked past this house a million times in my life. Monroe really is a tiny town.

“Where’s Pete?” I ask him when we walk into the quaint little living room, which actually smells really welcoming. It smells like Mikey and that’s nice, even if I hate the small house. I’ve been in his home quite a bit, even before he owned it, so it’s nothing new to me. Living room connects to the dining room which connects to the Kitchen. There’s no downstairs and the top floor has three bedrooms, with the staircase on the wall adjacent to the dining room.

“He’s at work. He got stuck with summer school,” Mikey says, and I remember that it’s actually the morning right now. It’s almost seven.

“Oh okay,” I say, and allow Mikey to walk me through to the kitchen where he hurriedly asks if I want anything. Pete’s an elementary school teacher so he has earlier hours than Mikey who does online work from home.

Mikey and Pete are probably the most well-known people in town, for bigoted reasons. There’s just no gay people in small towns. It’s unfortunate but it’s true. Mikey and Pete get by pretty well because it’s a relatively open minded town, but it’s not been easy for them, that’s for sure. Most of the people who were upset about their relationship were from the town over, which is about twenty miles away, but almost no one here was against it. Probably because everyone knows everyone else and everyone saw Mikey and Pete grow up. No one was about to hate their existence just like that. Still there have been some situations that have led to this particular house I’m in, being the best secured. They have an uncharacteristically high security system just to be safe. 

They’ve been together for almost seven years I think, but they’re only now planning to get married because they couldn’t have done so a year ago due to the law having been passed not too long ago. I would’ve had to come into town soon for that anyway, but it looks like I’ll already be here.

“Okay so I’m guessing you want to sleep for like the rest of the day or something?” Mikey asks, and I nod gratefully, “I thought that might be the case. You’re staying in the spare room, as usual. I made the bed and shit, but do you need anything?”

“Um, no I think I’m good.”

“Okay,” Mikey says, “we’re having dinner at mom and dad’s tonight so I’ll wake you if you’re not up by four.”

“You eat dinner at four?” I ask, trying to understand small town life.

“Well they’re having a barbecue to celebrate you coming home,” he says, as if this is obvious but it is actually pretty weird for new people to come into town. I’m not new actually, but it’s weird for the population to ever go up.

“Oh god is it like just us, or like everybody?” I ask, not overly excited to see all the people I’d abandoned when I left. Another weird thing about living in a town as small as Monroe is that no one ever really leaves. A few people after high school, but the community college a few miles away is where most people go. I didn’t go there though. I left as soon as I could. I haven’t stayed in this town for more than a few days in almost ten years.

“What do you think?” Mikey asks, and that is confirmation enough that basically the whole town has been invited.

“God I hate this place,” I groan, and Mikey sighs. He’s content here, and doesn’t understand my hatred for the town, but he can’t. It’s like a giant handcuff, or box. I can’t stand being so compacted and just, I hate it. I hate it. Hatehatehatehatehate. Hate. It.

Sheepishly I walk upstairs, find my new designated room, and crash almost instantly. I forget for the first time where I am, and the hell it’s going to be for me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay once again do you want me to keep going? I'm still not sure I know what this story is even about.


	3. Destination: Parents House

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gerard meets Frank, and dwells on all the bad things about his hometown.

Mikey wakes me up as he’d promised and forces me downstairs. Pete is standing next to the door and waves at me when I get down.

I’m pushed into the backseat of their car which is not at all belittling, and I groan as the car moves away from the house.

“Any gossip around town that I should know about?” I ask before we get there. Pete grins and looks at me from the passenger’s seat.

“Well Margaret and Danny got married. That was big,” Pete says, and I vaguely picture the two faces, “and Grandma Joannie got a hip replacement.”

“Oh exciting,” I say with sarcasm. I can’t believe Grandma Joannie is still alive. No offense to her but she was like 94 when I left town. I don’t actually know why everyone calls her ‘Grandma’ but that’s just who she’s always been.

“Yeah, and let’s see...” Pete goes on to tell me about who’s had kids and who’s dating who, what stores have popped up around town, and a lot of stuff I really don’t care about, but I’m surprised by the news of someone new coming to town.

“Wait what? Someone moved here? Here? Seriously?” I ask, and we’re almost there. I see a tree pass by, and remember learning to ride a bike for the first time and crashing into that tree. It’s distant to me now, but I still remember the bitch of a bloody nose that sucker gave me.

“Yeah, and he’s super cool too! He’s a little younger than you, but he’s really smart. He and I work together at the school,” Pete says, “He became the new English teacher after Mr. Lawrence retired. You’ll like him, he’s into the same music as you. His name is Frank.”

“Why would anyone move here, especially if they’ve got a whole life ahead of them?” I ask exasperatedly.

“Not everyone thinks so little about this town as you Gee,” Mikey says and he pulls up into the curb and parks. I see my childhood home from the car window, and it hasn’t changed even the tiniest bit. There are a few cars parked outside, but I assume most people just walked. We have a radius of under fifteen or so miles in this town so it’s not a far walk from anywhere.

Reluctantly, I open the car door and step outside. The air is temperate and comfortable, but I’m really not happy about the fact that I’m in this damn town so the nature of the weather is lost on me. The sky is bright blue, and there are few clouds, but it’s incredibly bright. They’re the kind of clouds that look strung out and wispy, against a steely blue backdrop filled with chirping birds. 

There are the typical birds out and about today. The blackbirds, and the ones I like to call the seesaw birds. I don’t know what they’re actually called but they used to wake me up in the early morning, and chirp at me on my way home from school and their squeak sounds an awful lot like someone saying the word “seesaw” over and over again.

I walk behind my brother and he leads me around the all too familiar house. The side of the house is bordered by a thin sidewalk but the rest is grass, well-mended because of the obsessive need for chic appearances that my mother has. There’s a large tree, older then the town itself, right there on the side of the beige house, with fallen leaves cluttering its base. The next house is a little ways away, about twenty feet from mine, because of the small incline at the base of the tree. It’s just a little hill, but inconvenient to have built anything on.

I look at the siding of the house, pristine and formal. I fell out of the second floor window on the side when I was nine. Long story, but basically I thought it would be easier to climb the tree if I started up high. Didn’t work, if that wasn’t made clear.

Mikey broke his wrist when he tripped on that little pothole in the sidewalk, which has since been filled but you can still see the discoloration in the concrete where the new cement meets the old. My shoes don’t leave imprints in the grass as we walk to the back of the house where several dozen people are gathered. 

There’s a wooden deck that elevates a small portion of the sizeable lawn, and a sliding door leading into the house. There are no fences or anything so the large wide layout extends all across the landscape in front of me for several yards until another, much steeper hill descends into a clearing on the edge of a small woods. Mikey and I would sled on that hill with neighbor kids almost every day during the winter months. Of course, being Minnesota, that means roughly five months out of twelve so I’ve been up and down that hill more times than I can count. 

The people in the clearing all have the generic smiles plastered on their faces. I’ve always seen the residents of this town as zombies for the most part. Sure there are some zombies who have hearts and interesting stories to tell, much like the characters of the book Warm Bodies, but they are still just defaulted human beings. It would be untrue to say that city dwellers are any different, but they, at least, don’t try to keep up appearances. People in the city know they’re all generic models of the same doll, but people in small towns haven’t figured out that concept quite yet. Maybe someday it’ll drill into their below average minds that they’re unoriginal, but until then they can have their little barbecue’s and their little book clubs or host their little tea parties with all their little old neighbors. At least I have the courtesy to be blunt with my insignificance, and don’t disguise it with that embrace of a smile as hollow as their galvanized souls.

I guess I’ve always related to T.S Eliot, not that I’ve ever cited him as a cause for my unnerving grasp of acrimony, but it is no fault of mine that I have an above-average rate of observance. My connection with Mr. Eliot on the heart of these flat people, can be found in one of his most notable works.

_We are the hollow men_   
_We are the stuffed men_   
_Leaning together_   
_Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!_   
_Our dried voices, when_   
_We whisper together_   
_Are quiet and meaningless_   
_As wind in dry grass_   
_Or rats' feet over broken glass_   
_In our dry cellar_

_Shape without form, shade without color,_   
_Paralyzed force, gesture without motion;_

_Those who have crossed_   
_With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom_   
_Remember us—if at all—not as lost_   
_Violent souls, but only_   
_As the hollow men_   
_The stuffed men._

People make it out to be depressing when you have such a distaste for the mundane normalcy of it all, but I feel it as a sort of melancholy that I’m able to see such routines as what they are. It’s bouts of weltschmerz like this that caused me to leave this town. I’m constantly haunted by the strangulation of these surroundings.

I’m brought out of my reverie by a thunderous session of simultaneous chants, applause and all around amazement at my appearance. They looks almost as if they’re surprised to see me, like they didn’t all gather here for that specific purpose.

Most of them I want to usher away from myself in disdain, but I try to keep a cordial tone when conversing with them, though I’m a tad rigid and I think I might give off the impression of hostility. They just assume it’s a trait learned from city life, but this doesn’t stop me from getting a few hurt stares.

My parents greet me with far too enthusiastic words that I pay little attention to, and they try to strike up a conversation with me about my reason for returning home, but I’m not really in the mood to talk about _her_. They drift off eventually because their son is so derisive, and Mikey walks over to me to torment me about the guy who’s apparently just arrived to the ‘party.’

Mikey points to a guy on the other side of the yard conversing with Pete casually and I almost do a double take. Okay, I may not be gay but I am not blind. That guy is hot. That guy can probably cook eggs on the side of his face, because he’s smoking. Then again, most of us out here probably can because the heat has started to taper down on our group with the passing time. I feel like an ant under a magnifying glass, not only with the attention I’m getting from the sun but also my old acquaintances.

“Okay so his name is Frank and I thought you two could talk because he’s got a similar way of thinking as you, though he’s heaps more polite then you and...” blah blah blah, something about New Jersey, blah blah blah, only child, blah blah blah something about the power puff girls, wait hold on that doesn’t seem right.

“What was that?” I ask Mikey.

“Oh so you were listening,” he says sarcastically. Typical Mikey, calling me out on my musing. 

The guy, or Frank I guess, has dark brown, almost black hair, and a tattoo on the side of his neck that I would normally find unattractive, but damn does it suit him. I like to consider myself straight, but that doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate the aesthetic beauty of guys, and this Frank guy has a face and body worth appreciating.

“Come on I’m going to go steal Pete from him,” Mikey says and he grabs my hand then pulls me forward.

“Pete!” Mikey says as we step right into the two guys’ conversation. He puts his arm around Pete and then turns to look at me like he forgot my existence.

“Oh right,” he says obviously caring little about the two of us while he’s with Pete, “Frank this is my brother Gerard, and Gerard this is Frank.”

“Where are you two going?” I ask him as he tries to drag Pete away.

“The answer to that is not for your ears, bro,” Mikey says, and I make a face as they walk away. I completely forget that the Frank guy is standing right next to me.

“And you grew up with that?” Frank says, and I turn back to look at him. I feel a little guilty for looking at him up close now because he’s even prettier in close proximity. I usually don’t get stunned into silence by people, but for a second I forget how to speak. Frank is definitely not a Monet.

“Well he’s in love,” I say solemnly and shrug, “What can you do?”

“That didn’t sound bitter at all,” Frank laughs and he looks at me. Wow he has beautiful eyes. Deep brown and warm, like he’s got a working hearth in the iris. They’re too warm for a day like this, but I can’t help but look into them as if he’s hypnotizing me.

“What’s the matter, don’t you like love?” He asks me.

“I like being in love, but I don’t like when it’s not reciprocated because it feels like shit,” I reply.

“Speaking from recent experience?” Frank asks looking at me. He has to look up at me because he’s kind of a short little guy.

“Why do you think I decided to uproot my entire life and move back to this hellhole?” I answer sadly, “Not by choice, I might add.”

“Hellhole? I like it here,” Frank says and he’s smiling brightly.

I shiver at the idea of anyone liking it here, “this place feels like a vacuum to me. It sucks your life away and then stores it in a cramped and poisonous enclosure full of dirt.”

“I’m glad to see you’re an optimist.”

I snort, breathily at him, “You have no idea.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Worked a little harder on this chapter. Worth it or no?


	4. Objective: Talk to Frank

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Definitely no foreshadowing in this chapter. Definitely not. Especially not in the very last sentence *wink wink*

“I have never met anyone in my life who is such a pessimist, I’m not going to lie,” Frank says after about fifteen minutes.

“Well I’ve never met such an enthusiastic optimist,” I reply.

“No, it wasn’t meant to be an insult, I just don’t understand why you’d be so negative about everything. Don’t you ever tire of being depressed?”

I haven’t ever thought about that, “It’s not like a switch that you can just turn on and off when you want.”

“Yeah, but you’re never going to find enjoyment in anything if you don’t at least allow yourself to have fun,” Frank says cheerily.

“What do you mean?”

“Well you came to this little party here expecting to be bored and hate it, so that’s all your allowing yourself to see. The bad stuff isn’t more populous then the good, it’s just louder to you. Negativity and suffering always seems so much more grandeur when you’re looking back on it, and that disillusion waters down all the good.”

“You sound like a therapist,” I say, and I’m speaking from experience.

“No, I’m just not clouded by heaps of contemptuous shit like you are,” Frank retorts, “If you were to grow ten roses in your backyard and eight of them bloomed, then you’d just dwell on the two roses that didn’t because you’re only looking for bad. The two roses that didn’t boom are no more prevalent then the living plants you disregarded, but they go unnoticed because you don’t see anything that isn’t in the same state of misery as you.”

“You’re calling me a cynic?”

“I’m calling you a cynic,” He nods.

He doesn’t even sugarcoat it. No one is that blunt. Seriously everybody in this town would try to be nice and indirect about saying something like that, but not Frank. That’s the most refreshing thing I’ve heard in months. 

I kind of like this Frank guy.

“What?” he asks after I stare at him for a little longer then I should have.

“Nothing! It’s just...” I shake it off. Maybe he was actually trying to be rude and I mistook it. Still, he has a pretty good way with words that are abnormally accurate.

“’Just’ what?” He raises an eyebrow.

“I mean, well,” might as well just tell him, “no one’s ever been so brutally honest with me, and it’s kind of cool.”

“Telling you off for being a prick is cool?”

“I’m not a prick necessarily, I’m just not the most sociable,” I defend.

“Well every time you have a conversation with someone you use rudeness as a defense mechanism to keep yourself alone, and that sounds pretty much like a prick to me.”

“I do not!” I say. I don’t use rudeness as a defense mechanism! Where would he get that idea from?

“Oh really? So what do you call mouthing off to everyone else here until I’m the only person left willing to talk to you?”

“That’s not-,“ do I actually do that? Did I actually do that to everyone else here? I thought I was being as polite as I could be, but is Frank right?

Frank looks up at me with his eyebrow still raised expectantly and I feel like a two year old who was just caught doing something they weren’t supposed to do.

“I didn’t even realize I was doing that,” I finally say.

“Well I’d say cynicism is in your blood then, but Mikey is the nicest guy I know so obviously it’s just you,” Frank says with a shrug.

“Well thanks, for the sincerity.”

“Just a moment ago you said my honesty was cool.”

I sigh, “there’s a difference between being unusually honest and being a dickhead, and the line between the two is very faint, but you sir, have managed to cross that line in record time.”

“You’re calling me a dickhead?” He says beaming at me with a devilish look.

“I’m calling you a dickhead.”

He laughs and says, “The cynic and the dickhead. We’d make a great comedy duo. Or maybe a really messed up sitcom.”

What is this guy even? He doesn’t seem human. It’s like he’s the only person other than me who’s actually looking at things critically. The strange thing is that he looks at everything critically, but only notes the positive things. I don’t understand how that’s even possible. I’m a critical person, but that means I’m also incredibly dejected about everything, but this guy seems to only notice the good things. Other than me that is. He likes all the positive things, but he likes pointing out all the bad things in me. What’s so different about me?

The best way I can describe it is like we’re both in the middle of the ocean, surrounded by drowning victims. Everyone we see is drowning because they don’t know how to swim, but Frank and I are treading water pretty well. All I can think about in this situation is that I’m surrounded by dying people, and underneath me could be any number of dangerous things. Yet there Frank is, pointing out that it’s a nice day, and not storming, or that we’re wearing clothes that aren’t dragging us down. All I see is the negative things about our predicament and Frank only points out the things with hope in them.

I didn’t even know that such positivity was possible, but Frank is standing right in front of me, and he’s living proof. How did he ever learn to be so optimistic? It doesn’t seem natural to me. Now that I think of it he’s making my whole belief seem unnatural as well. It’s not right to be that happy, but it’s not right to be this sad either. 

What the hell is up with this guy?

“So tell me, why did you move here?”

Frank smiles like he’d been waiting for that question, “I moved here for the people. I grew up in a place where you didn’t know your neighbors. The neighbors you did know only ever talked to you when they wanted to debate the property line or yell at you for being too rowdy. I never fit in, because I never liked regarding the people I lived around as undesirable, so I got the hell out of there, to a place where people care about each other.”

“Caring is so tiresome though,” I complain.

“It doesn’t have to be, not when you like the people you live near, and I do. I think the people in this town are pretty great.”

“Apart from me apparently,” I mumble.

“Hey, I never said that! I don’t think you’re necessarily a bad person you’re just a little negative.”

“Yeah but if there’s anything that an optimist hates it’s their pessimist counterpart,” I point out.

“You’ve been talking to the wrong people,” Frank shakes his head, “I choose not to surround myself with hate because it makes the world so much less fun. How can I be expected to enjoy things if I let my hate cloud everything?”

“I’m pretty good at it.”

Frank rolls his eyes, “the point is that I wasn’t meant for big city life. I like the freedom that comes with knowing kind people, with different degrees of complexity.”

“No one here is complex. Everyone is content in scraping by without ever really trying to live. People always let you down like that. They make you believe they’re something and then they screw you over when you realize it was all just pretend. Just fake. Like everyone in this town. Everything is fake.”

It’s true though. These trees are cardboard cutouts and these people are nothing more than puppets on ragged string.

“Who hurt you to make you like this? Who _hurt_ you?” Frank asks, and as soon as he says that he looks regretful of his words.

“Sometimes it’s our own sins that drive us into dereliction.”

Frank nods but says, “And sometimes people are too content being lost that they don’t realize how hurt they really are. Sometimes you need to be pushed into action before you can ever help yourself up.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Review maybe?


	5. Destination: Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Unpleasant things.

Sometimes I cry and I don’t know why.

That’s a little secret adults don’t tell you, because you have to figure it out yourself. You cry. You hurt all the time. You hurt 24/7 and sometimes it gets to be so much that you don’t even understand why you cry about it anymore, or what you’re crying for. It just sort of happens, and you have to go with it but you try to stop and you can’t.

In seventh grade I started crying in the middle of class, and I don’t know what caused it. It’s been too many years to remember what it felt like, but I just remember being sad. Feeling pointless, feeling... insignificant. I didn’t think I’d ever get anywhere, and to this day that feeling persists with me, but it’s grown into a dull ache. I’m still afraid that no one will care about me, and it hasn’t gotten better, if anything its gotten worse, I have just learned how to pretend it’s not there.

Just like in seventh grade I cry sometimes and I don’t know why. There had been this kid that I sat next to, he was a friend of mine, and he just seemed so concerned. He’d asked me what was wrong, but I just didn’t have an answer. It had been homeroom, right after lunch, so I wasn’t distracting a class or anything, but I’d built a little barrier out of geography textbooks. I remember wanting to crawl underneath the desks. That kid didn’t stop asking me what was wrong, but after a while I think he knew I wasn’t going to answer so he didn’t ask as much. I’d caught the attention of two other people who questioned me, but when I didn’t answer they walked away.

It had taken me twenty minutes to stop, but every time I tried to it felt like my soul was being hammered on, or squeezed, and I just wanted it to go away. What I felt in seventh grade is the same feeling I get to this day.

If I could describe that feeling I get when this happens, I wouldn’t. No one deserves to know what that feels like. It’s just something you should never try to experience, like getting shot or being stabbed. That feeling is far worse though because it’s internal, it attacks from your core, and then spreads. 

I’ve been known to demonstrate mental pain physically in my life through things like sweating, and I once slept for two days.

For some reason I’m having another one of those nights.

I feel that tugging in my stomach that is like the countdown to a bomb, just as I’m stepping into Mikey’s house. It’s about nine, and I want to go to bed, but I can’t let Mikey hear me collapse. 

“Mikey I’m going to, uh, take a drive, if that’s okay?”

“What? Why?”

“Just want to clear my head, and be alone for a little while,” I say.

Mikey knows me well enough to know that’s not exactly an ideal phrase to hear from me but he doesn’t protest.

He’s heard it a lot actually, come to think of it. A few years ago when Mikey lived with me in New York for a little while, he’d heard that a lot. It’s been five years now so I think he’s let it go, but he’s not one to forget, and I see the gears turning in his mind.

“You’re okay though?”

“Yeah I just need to... this town is strangling me, I need to breathe for a few minutes,” I lie. I think it’s believable enough though.

“Promise?”

“Promise,” I say and I turn to walk back out the door. I intend to keep my promise I just need to freak out right now where no one’s going to judge me.

At this point the more I prolong it the more it’s going to hurt. It’s like Tourette syndrome, in the way that you can hold it back for a little while, but when it finally comes out it’s going to be twice as bad. I have no choice though, I can’t breakdown right now, not while I’m driving.

I pull to the side of the road after driving for about twenty minutes. I’d drive a little further, but right now I feel dizzy, like my whole head is full of helium or something. It’s painful even though my head feels lightweight and almost feathery. My brain is humming and buzzing like cell phone on vibrate.

I stop the car on a quiet stretch of road, where it’s unlikely many, or any cars at all, are going to drive by. 

My head is pounding. How long have I had a headache? I can’t remember anything that would have caused it but I don’t know if it’s just because of the feeling. 

My body reminds itself to cry at this point and my stomach feels like it’s being squeegeed, like someone’s ringing my insides the way you would a towel.

“Ow! Fuck,” I say as my head collides with the driver’s side window. I hadn’t meant to slam it against the clear pane but I do so anyway, and the sensation feels like salt on an open wound to my banging head.

It’s too loud in here. There’s no noise actually coming from the car, but I shove the door open and then close it to stand on my legs and stretch out. It’s no quieter out here, and for some reason it sounds like there are sirens resonating from my inner ear.

For a long moment I can’t decide if I’m cold or hot. I get a shill followed by an intense wave of heat and the two combine to make me feel like someone’s playing with my internal thermostat as if it’s a game. My body shivers then burns, and I don’t know what to do, so I pull up the sleeves of my shirt but then my body shudders from polar temperatures. 

Something feels weird. My stomach feels more than just mentally sick, it feels physical.

I figure it out a second before my body reacts and I hunch over to the side and taste unpleasantly acidic bile. I hate puking, even after being so used to it. I hadn’t eaten much food at the party, and the only food I did eat was because Mikey told me to. I don’t have the same appetite I used to and I find it nearly impossible to actually eat things so it’s no surprise that there’s nothing in my stomach to actually throw up. It makes the smell worse though, and I wipe my mouth after a minute, and walk over to the hood of the car to lean down on the hood.

I’m sweating pretty badly, but it’s hot outside so I’m not surprised by the perspiration. My arms still tingle with cold as well, and it gets to be that the heat itself feels icy so I don’t know what I feel anymore. My shirt sticks to me and bunches up to make my skin itchy, but I don’t notice because I’m still sobbing. I want to stop crying. I want to drive back into town and sleep because my whole body feels limp with exhaustion, but I also know that I’m shaking so much I wouldn’t be able to grip the steering wheel if I tried. I can’t focus on anything, not even the night sky, because the wet tears on my face blur everything around me.

The adrenaline in my system makes my muscles burn and croak as I try to push the feeling away but it only makes my breathing get harder. I’m wheezing for air but my chest has contracted to not allow any air to fall through my lungs. I can’t breathe while I’m crying but I can’t stop crying to breathe.

To be completely honest I feel like I’m dying. Sweat coats my face, and makes my hair stick to the top of my head and ears so I push it away which severely ruins whatever hairstyle I’m sporting right now. My hands creep up my body to make sure that I’m not being choked, because I feel someone’s hands around my esophagus but there’s nothing there. 

Am I going insane?

Am I dying?

I don’t know if I’ve ever been more scared then I am right now.

~*~*~*~

The next thing I know is that I’m waking up to a loud sound.

I don’t know what just happened, but I completely lost every second of the last few hours. It honestly feels like someone jump cut my life.

The sun is leaking through the window of my car, and my back is stiff and aching against the backseat of my car. How did I get here?

I groan trying to pull myself up and the sun is blinding. It’s got the same effect as when you wake up from a really bad hangover which is what I feel like right now. My head throbs, and my stomach clenches, yearning for sustenance. I smell like piss, sweat and vomit, so I must be a wreck.

It takes me a minute to push myself out of my lying position and when I do so I try to place the annoying ring coming from somewhere in front of me until I realize it’s my phone. It takes my groggy mind a few moments to pinpoint the source of the noise and when it clicks that my phone is ringing I jump to try and find it but the noise stops before I do.

I shake my head, and rub my eyes to try and send the fatigue away but it does nothing. I feel like I just swallowed a giant case of Nyquil or something but I know I’m not going to get back to sleep.

My limbs are dangling ropes against my body and I put my hand to my head to try and remember what happened after I got here last night. I faintly recall dragging myself into the car but that’s about it. My arm shows signs of being eaten alive by pesky mosquitoes, as I have a heavy set of bumps on my exposed skin almost like little pimples but red and painful and itchy. They’re stinging to scratch so I pull the sleeves of my shirt down so that I can’t tempt myself.

The noise starts up again and this time I use the sound to help me find my phone like a game of Marco Polo. 

I find it after the fourth ring and answer it to make the annoying sound go away.

“Hello?” I ask and my voice sound hoarse. I have to clear my throat so that it doesn’t sound like I’ve lost my voice altogether.

“Where the fuck are you?” Mikey asks, and he sounds pissed. I’d forgotten to check the caller ID, but I should’ve know who it was on the other end anyway considering how overbearing he can be. He’s just trying to look out for me and I know that.

“I’m sorry, I honestly just fell asleep in my car.”

“Have you been drinking?” He asks and he sounds far past the point of anger. He is livid.

“What? No, Mikey of course not!” I say defensively, “I swear I haven’t done anything like that.”

“Then what happened?”

“I just wanted to go for a drive and then I was feeling sick,” I say honestly, “I stopped on the side of the road and then I just fell asleep. I’m sorry.”

“You should be! The second I realized you didn’t come home last night I freaked out. How could you? Why didn’t you call?”

“I just forgot okay? I was feeling like shit and I forgot.”

“You forgot? How do I know you weren’t drinking?”

“I didn’t! I wasn’t! I did not drink anything. You can smell me if you have to, okay? You’re not going to want to, but I promise there is no booze on me.”

“Alright, fine, but get your ass in this house as soon as you can, or quicker.”

“Okay I’ll be there soon, I’m not feeling very good so I’ll be a little while because I don’t want to drive to quick.”

“Just whenever you can. I’m not through with you yet, you know.”

“Yeah I figured. See you in a few okay?”

I hang up a moment later and my head falls against the head rest in the back as I try to summon up the will to move.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments are greatly appreciated.


	6. Objective: Don't Puke

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tension builds between the Way's.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so I realize that this story is starting to sound a little grim, but I promise this will have a happy ending. I have a burning hate for things that make me cry even if I can't help but to love them (curse you TFioS and Death Note).

“So where were you really? Please tell me not at a bar,” Mikey asks the second I step through the door.

“I didn’t lie! I’m not lying! I swear,” I say honestly. 

Mikey looks unconvinced, and sighs at me.

“I wish I knew how to prove I didn’t do anything, but I don’t. I was honestly just in my car,” I say, and I feel bad because it does seem sort of illogical.

“Would you promise to tell me if you did do something?” he asks.

“Yes. I’m sorry. Honestly, I should’ve called. I stopped on the road to clear my head, and then I just fell asleep,” I leave out the part where I puked because that’s not going to make Mikey believe I was sober.

“Okay,” He nods but he looks uncertain.

“Okay?” I ask, and he nods his head noncommittally, “I’m going to take a shower then.”

I hope I don’t smell as bad as I think I do, but I can’t be sure so I walk up the stairs quickly, after waving to Pete in the kitchen. 

As soon as I see myself in the mirror I realize why Mikey was so hesitant to believe me. I look like I’ve got a major hangover. My eyes look back at me and they’re a bloodshot red, and sunken into my skull even more than usual. I’ve had bags under my eyes for a few months now, but they’re usually not this deep. 

I don’t know what time it is right now, or what time I fell asleep last night so I have no idea if I should feel this exhausted or not. It feels like I’ve got a ten pound weight tied around my neck. I’m being held down and choked at the same time.

I peal my shirt off of me, and as if to prove my point for me, it doesn’t smell too dandy. I smell homeless to be perfectly honest, but I try to pretend I don’t notice.

I evaluate myself in the mirror and I look unhealthy. I’ve lost weight, far too much to be good for me, and I haven’t been trying. I haven’t tried, but it’s melted off of me, and I realize I’m not hungry. I look like a walking cadaver and yet I have no desire to rectify that by eating anything.

I step into the shower and the warm water makes me melt because I haven’t relaxed in a while. 

Truth be told, I would’ve stayed in there forever given the option. I don’t have that opportunity though, because before I can even rinse the conditioner out of my hair I feel a roiling in my stomach and I have to make an awkwardly slippery jump to the toilet. I still haven’t eaten anything so I don’t understand where the vomit comes from. I keep the shower running to mask the sound of my insides resurfacing so Mikey won’t have even more of a reason to worry. When I trust that I’m done, the shower doesn’t have as much appeal to me as a mattress does.

I rinse the last of the soap out of my hair, dry off, and get dressed quickly.

When I step out of the small bathroom I hear laughing from downstairs, only the number of voices doesn’t match the number I had expected. There’s three people, not two.

Curious, I make my way down the steps while trying to remove the water in my ear. I see the familiar face of the guy Mikey introduced me to yesterday.

I feel awful about it, but I don’t remember his name. I don’t remember much of yesterday at all, like it was erased from my brain but Mikey doesn’t leave me hanging for long.

“Hey Gee! You remember Frank, right?”

“Yeah, I just didn’t realize you were having company,” I say and I don’t think my lie is detectable because the three of them look relaxed around the dining room table. There’s an unoccupied seat right next to Frank that I suppose they left for me.

“We’re allowed to have friends who aren’t each other, Gerard,” Mikey says.

“Right, yeah, sorry.”

“Do you, like, hate me for what I said yesterday?” Frank asks.

“What?” I ask and I try to remember what he said, “I don’t um... I actually don’t remember what you said.”

“Really? We had a whole conversation,” Frank doesn’t believe me. No one believes me today. Why should they when I’m a handful of discrepancies?

“My head isn’t working properly right now I’m sorry,” I answer and then vaguely remember something. “Oh wait, yeah, you called me a cynic.”

“Pretty much,” Frank nods, and I decide I’d better walk all the way down the stairs and sit at the table so that he doesn’t call me out for being antisocial again.

“No I don’t hate you for that. I am a cynic,” I agree, “and you’re a dickhead.”

Mikey sends me an angry look, “Gerard!”

“No it’s okay,” Frank laughs, “It’s not untrue.”

“It’s just not polite to go around calling people dickheads,” Mikey answers.

“Well, if the shoe fits,” Frank says and laughs playfully, turning to look at me. I don’t know why his smile is so beautiful, especially considering the fact that I wasn’t even trying to notice it, but he is like sunshine. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone look so physically bright and welcoming. He’s the human embodiment of a puppy which is weird because he just dissed me into oblivion less than a day ago.

His eyes are still as warm as they were yesterday and I feel guilty for looking at him for too long, so I dart my eyes away after initially sitting down next to him. It seems like a crime to stare at someone so pure for that long. Why do I care so much about his appearance? Why do I care about _him_ , is a better question actually. 

“We ordered lunch from the pizza place since Pete and I forgot to go grocery shopping,” Mikey says a second later. “I hope you’re okay with cheese because Frank doesn’t eat meat.”

“No that’s okay, I’m not hungry.”

“What?” Mikey asks looking surprised, “you hardly ate anything yesterday and nothing today. How can you not be hungry?”

“I’m just not.”

“That’s not an answer, you need to eat,” Mikey says, and Pete nods.

“It’s not that big a deal,” I mumble, but the doorbell rings a second later and he hops up to get it.

“Are you okay Gerard you look kind of green?” Pete asks me while Mikey pays the guy at the door and also has a conversation with him because they’re friends. Of course they are. Who in this town isn’t friends with Mikey?

“I’m fine,” I say and I hope I don’t look as bad as I’m picturing in my head. I’m not sure what the color green looks like on me, but I don’t think it’s as flattering on me as it is on the Incredible Hulk.

“Would you eat something at least? You haven’t really eaten a thing since you got here,” Mikey says after I decline the plate he tries to give me.

“I’m honestly not hungry.”

“You have to eat something,” Mikey says and he looks irked.

“No! I’m fine.”

Mikey raises his voice a little bit and I can tell we’re both getting aggravated, “Gerard I don’t like the way you’re not eating anything. Just take it!”

“I said no!” I answer, and my voice is also a little loud.

“Gerard just-“

“No Mikey! Stop patronizing me!” I yell, and instantly feel remorseful about it. Mikey looks half scared and half surprised. Pete and Frank wear identical faces that tell me that they both wish they were anywhere else. I just made the room fall into uncomfortable silence.

“Fine. Fine,” Mikey raises his hands in defeat, but he looks irate about having to surrender.

“Sorry I didn’t mean to-“

“Whatever Gerard. It’s your life.”

Oh he’s pissed. He’s going to give me the cold shoulder for the rest of the day I can already tell. If he’s going to act like that though, then I’m not afraid to reciprocate. 

I can be a stubborn little asshole when I so wish it, and I am right now. Pete, tries to alter the conversation off topic and steers the gauntlet to Frank. He makes a not so subtle remark about music and this sends Frank into an excited tizzy about bands. 

It actually works really well. I’m almost mystified by how quickly I forget to be angry with Mikey because of the way that Frank talks. The amount of passion he has for the topic is unbelievable. Watching Frank talk about music is like watching Bill Nye talk about science. You can literally see the love and passion in his eyes, and hear it in his voice.

It’s enough to distract me from the smell of the food so that I don’t even realize how my stomach begins to feel like hell again. 

It kills me to interrupt him, but I have to or else things won’t be pretty, “I have to go, I’ll be back in a minute.”

I bolt upstairs as quickly as I can, feeling the red on my face brought there by the embarrassment of leaving the table or the heat of my churning insides. I’m getting kind of sick of getting sick.

I rub it off as just stress though. I doubt I’m actually sick, but I make a mental note whilst hurling to at least get a checkup a few towns over, just to be safe. As far as I can drive to be sure that Mikey won’t hear about it. 

I lean my back against the door, with my hair sticking to my face, still wet from the shower. I try to catch my breathing but I might as well have just run a marathon. My body aches and my lungs have given out. 

“Gerard?” A voice asks, and I’m actually thankful for the fact that it’s Pete’s. The door is still closed so I know he’s on the other side of it.

“I’m fine. I’m just-“

“Puking,” Pete finishes my sentence. 

I groan, but stand up slowly, and open the door. Pete looks at me knowingly but at least he doesn’t look mad.

“Don’t tell Mikey, Pete. He’ll only get more worried.”

“I...” Pete looks unsure, “fine. For now. But if things get worse than I’m not going to hesitate.”

“It’s just one time,” I try to justify.

“No it’s not, you were looking green downstairs,” Pete says sternly. “Will you answer me this honestly: have you been drinking?”

“No,” I answer and I make eye contact so that he hopefully understands that I’m not lying, “I promise.”

“You should see a doctor though,” Pete says.

“I know, I’m on it. Mikey hears nothing about it though, okay?”

“Like I said, fine. For now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And I know I sound generic, but I honestly cherish comments!


	7. Destination: Doctor's Office

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A doctor makes a troubling announcement. Not The Doctor that would be a completely different story.

“Mikey is really fucking pissed at you,” Frank says to me when I walk down the stairs. He’s still sitting at the table, but I don’t see Mikey.

“Where’d he go?”

“No idea. He just up and left, but you might want to avoid him for the next few days,” Frank says.

“When’s he getting back?” Pete asks. “Gerard how about you go while Mikey’s out.”

“Go where?” Frank asks.

“I’m making him see a doctor.”

“Because he just puked his guts out?” Frank questions.

“Is it that obvious?” I ask feeling stupid.

“A little, but Mikey so angry he probably won’t notice as long as you don’t throw up _on_ him,” Frank reassures.

“Well I’m glad I got through to him,” I say, “I’ll be heading out then.”

“Maybe you should take Frank with you,” Pete options, and then notices my confused expression, “you’re sick. It might be best if he drives with you.”

“I barely know him,” I answer.

“Aw come on. I’m a dickhead, what else do you need to know?”

“’How many people have you murdered’ would be a good question for you to answer. If you have to think about it then I think I’ll be fine on my own, thanks.”

“Oh come on. It’s only like seven people. Maybe eight. Depends on what you mean by murder,” Frank jokes, and I roll my eyes, but smile at him all the same.

“Is that a yes?” Frank asks with a shit-eating grin. He’s adorable, and I don’t want to give in too easily, but it would be like shooting a kitten.

“Fine,” he doesn’t look surprised by my answer, “but I want to get far enough out of town that Mikey won’t hear wind of this.”

“Ooh road trip!” Frank says, and he jumps up out of his seat. I’d almost forgotten how short he is. Almost.

“We’re taking my car,” I say, and I walk over to the front door where I grab my keys and hear Frank following.

“Duh,” Frank says, “I don’t even have a car.”

I guess that makes sense. It’s not too hard to get around town without a car.

“I’ll stay here to console Mikey when he gets back,” Pete calls after me as I open the door and Frank prances out ahead of me. “Gee, do you want to consider maybe staying at your parents’ house tonight, if he’s still angry?”

“I’ll think about it. Text me if you think it’s better I stay away,” I tell him and Pete nods before I close the door behind me, and follow Frank to the curb where he’s now leaning against my car. He’s standing on the driver’s side and I can see the words on his lips before he even voices them.

“I want to drive!” Frank says excitedly.

“Are you sure you’re tall enough to reach the pedals?” I tease.

“I will cut you,” Frank replies, and I know he’s joking, but he looks dead serious. He looks weird trying to be intimidating. He’s not very threatening.

I just groan, and hope I sound annoyed but I’m a little amused. I actually feel a hell of a lot better after that second round of puking.

I throw the keys at him and he looks beyond enthusiastic. I feel giddy at the emotion on his face.

“You hurt my car,” I start with warning in my voice, “and I will probably not be very upset because it’s a piece of shit.”

He laughs and I start to wonder how he’s so carelessly happy. It’s natural, which doesn’t seem possible. 

~*~*~*~

“Well Mr. Way I don’t see any cause for alarm. You might want to get something for an upset stomach but over the counter will work just fine,” the doctor says, looking at me. We stopped after about an hour because I didn’t want to go to some 30 minute doctor at CVS. Frank had been a little annoyed but he turned the music up louder and got over it pretty quickly. We’re in a small clinic outside a moderately sized town, with the first doctor who’d see me.

“Okay, great,” I answer. I hadn’t expected him to turn anything up but I’m glad that I checked just in case.

“One more thing though,” he says as I stand up, “I’d recommend you to go see a psychiatrist.”

That doesn’t sound good at all, “why?”

“I don’t think I’m really the best person to diagnose it, but I wouldn’t be surprised if you had some sort of anxiety disorder. Actually I think that’s very likely.”

“Anxiety disorder?”

“Depression maybe. It’s possible you also have a mild panic disorder,” the doctor says, “I’m not really a diagnostician so I could be way off.”

“But I’m okay then?” I ask.

“I believe so.”

“Great,” I answer curtly, and grab my jacket. No way am I going to see a psychiatrist. He must be a complete idiot if he thinks there’s a chance in hell of me doing anything like that. 

“Do you want me to recommend someone for you?” The doctor asks me. “There’s a clinic down in Minneapolis specifically for mental disorders and-“

“No. I’m fine,” I interrupt and even I’m surprised by the edge to my voice. 

“I’m sorry sir, I didn’t mean to offend you or anything. I think it would be good for you to see someone though.”

“Well I don’t. Thank you for your time,” I say and I grab the door handle and make my dramatic exit. I have a flair for the dramatics sometimes and it looks like I’m a bit of a diva today.

“Whoa what’s up, with you Mr. grumpy face?” Frank says when I walk into the lobby.

“Nothing. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You don’t want to talk about nothing? Sounds like something,” he says standing up. He follows me as I walk quickly out of the building.

“Not nothing, but I don’t want to talk about.”

“You’re okay though right?”

“I’m fine, he said I’m fine,” I answer. I speed walk toward my car and Frank stumbles along behind me.

“Except for what?”

“Frank,” I turn to him with my hand on the driver’s side handle, “leave it alone.”

“You don’t have to tell me, but you’ll tell Mikey if something is wrong?”

“Mikey doesn’t control me for god’s sake! Why does everyone think I can’t handle myself? I’m an adult. I don’t need my little brother to babysit me.”

Frank nods and gets into the car, not objecting to me driving. I get in after him and sigh.

My phone buzzes as soon as I get into the car and I look down to see a text from Pete.

**Pete: Mikey is out 4 ur blood. Do not approach.**

I guess this means I have to find somewhere else to stay tonight.

I don’t know why I come clean to him, but it just falls out of my mouth for some reason and I say, “He thinks I’ve got depression.”

“You don’t have to talk about-“

“I’m scared of what that means for me.”

“Was it like speculation or what?” Frank asks.

“He said it was very likely and he wants me to see somebody about it.”

“You don’t have to be, uh, ashamed about it, Gerard. A lot of people have depression, it’s manageable,” Frank tries to comfort me, but I’m not really in the mood to hear it.

“Well he was wrong though,” I answer. It’s not denial, I don’t think. I can’t. I don’t want to be. I’m not depressed. Not clinically anyway.

“Gerard we _just_ met, it’s not my place, but I think you should consider-“

“No. I’m fine. We’re not going to talk about this.”

Frank says nothing for a minute so I start the ignition. 

“I’m not going to interfere. I just hope you know what you’re doing.”

For a long while we just drive in silence. It’s still mid-afternoon but it feels later, because off how tired I am. Eventually it feels like the air might be a little clearer between us and I clear my throat.

“I, um, I sort of need some place to stay tonight.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Click here to check out my new story](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1742450/chapters/3720218)
> 
>  
> 
> Comments are much appreciated.


	8. Objective: Get Better?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is just static for now, I need some time to clear my head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have to make a confession. This story is about overcoming depression, and I’m trying so hard to do it justice. I want to be able to show that it is possible, but my confession is that I’m a hypocrite.
> 
> I’m not a happy person, and I ask you to forgive me for that fact, so please don’t hold that against me. The story will remain the same. I’m just sorry for being such a hypocrite. Maybe it’s better to write this story to demonstrate the goal I’m trying to reach. I want to be better, and I’ll be damned if you ever see me stop trying.

It feels like someone’s boiling my insides. I feel like I’m dying. My heart aches like you can’t believe. I don’t understand this feeling. I don’t want to be this, I want to be happy, but at the same time I don’t. My body is a million degrees on the inside and negative digits on the outside. At once it feels like my insides are on fire but my skin is freezing.

I don’t know what I feel anymore.

Numb?

Blank?

Dead.

I feel dead. I don’t know how I came to be like this, all I know is that I don’t want to be this person. I don’t want to be this person who’s always stewing in self-loathing. I can’t pretend to be someone I’m not though.

If I could characterize this feeling of brokenness it would probably be in the form of an existential metaphor. I’m a ratty old cliché that’s been slammed so hard into the dirt that I can’t even remember what hurts. 

I think its oblivion. It’s oblivion that hurts. It’s the feeling of pointlessness. There’s nothing that makes me special, and I’m still trying to wrap my head around the stupidity of living. Why, and how do we have any consciousness at all if it’s only ever a terminal illness? Everyone dies, and sooner or later everyone is forgotten. If I am to be forgotten then why do I even push forward in the first place? 

I’m Eleanor Rigby. Lonely, and lost. Who is ever going to remember me? Why does anyone try?

Why does life even have to happen if it ends up being deadly? The whole prospect of life is an oxymoron. Life is deadly, but still we clutch onto this rotating pile of rock and we go along for the ride. The ride that is so full of complete shit, and bad and horrible, wretched people, and there is ultimately no point to it all. 

We live and then we die, and I don’t care if you think there’s an afterwards or none at all, because the point is that we are all future corpses.

Why do I try so hard to be happy when it’s clear that happiness was not meant for me? It’s a lifestyle that does not suit my own. Whenever I try to be happy I end up hurting everyone else in the fire. There’s no happiness for me even though I try to pretend there is.

“Gerard?” Frank asks.

I hadn’t even noticed where we were until I stop the car. I’m in front of Mikey’s house. This is not where I meant to go. Mikey is inside probably talking about how much he hates me. I don’t think I blame him. All the crap I’ve put him through and I’m still ungrateful to him. He’s the only person keeping me sane and it’s me that’s driving him insane. Why do I always hurt the people I love? All the stuff I do to try and make things better for the people I love is actually what makes things worse.

“Are you okay?”

“I’ve heard that a lot in the past few days,” I answer him. “To be honest I don’t know. I don’t know who I am anymore.”

“I’m not going to pretend I know how you feel because that would be a lie and I don’t want to demean the hurt you’re in, but I think you need to allow people to help you. I think you need to start trying to get better.”

“I don’t know what better is.”

“You’ve pushed yourself into crisis mode, Gerard. I wasn’t lying when I told you that you only see the bad yesterday,” Frank answers. My eyes are focused on my hands on the wheel and nowhere else. 

I think he’s right. The trouble is that I’m far too comfortable being miserable to try and change. It’s not something that is easily fixed. I’m already broken and there are too many missing pieces to even try picking them up.

“Mikey doesn’t want to see me,” I say, pulling away from the house. I don’t know where Frank lives actually but I want to get away from this house.

“Gerard if you need to talk to him I’m sure he won’t mind.”

“But I don’t need to talk to him,” I answer.

“You keep telling yourself that but it’s never going to start being true.”

“I don’t need anyone’s _help_.”

Frank groans, “You have to fucking grow a pair! Everyone needs help sometimes. There’s no good reason to deny that. Sometimes you need help. I’m not saying your incompetent or anything, I’m just saying that you’re blind to how stupid this pride is.”

“I’m not trying to protect my pride-“

“Yes you damn well are!” Frank barks. He sighs and then rubs his eyes tiredly. Frank quietly gives me a direction and I remember what I asked him earlier.

Suddenly it doesn’t seem like such a great idea to go stay with him.

“Maybe I shouldn’t-“

“I’m not judging you Gerard. I’m just telling you how idiotic this pride is,” Frank answers. He is a character if I’ve ever met one. He’s also a stubborn little bastard.

“I’m pretty fucked up.”

“Who isn’t?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My friend tried to kill herself last week, and this week she told me how she started harming herself again. I’m going to dedicate this story to her. I just want to beg anyone and everyone reading this to never do anything to hurt yourself.


	9. Destination: Frank's House

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He eats!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't abandon this! You thought I did didn't you? But I didn't. I'm going to update this like a snail though.

“Have you ever gone a day without complaining? You do realize that it’s hard to feel sympathetic for someone when they’re so pissed off all the time.”

I ignore Frank so he keeps talking, “I mean you’re just so negative. What do you think you’re going to accomplish by being miserable all the time?”

“Absolution maybe.”

“You’re like the human embodiment of Eeyore, you know that? I’ve never met someone more down about anything in my entire life.”

“Thanks for the manners,” I retort. 

Frank’s house is pretty typical for this town. He’s a little better at decorating than some people so the furniture at least matches and the paint isn’t pealing, but it’s still old and fairly dark. The layout is a little bigger than Mikey’s house, but not as open. The front door leads into the living room which is pretty large with dark brown carpeting, and there’s a doorway on the other side of the room that leads into a kitchen. The kitchen has old appliances, the stove alone is probably older than me and Frank combined. There’s a dishwasher though which can’t be old, because I don’t think more than five or six people in town have something as grand as that. That’s probably Frank’s touch, and I can’t say I blame him. After washing dishes my whole life, and then having a dishwasher at my apartment, I really wouldn’t want to go back.

“You’re not exactly the easiest person to be nice to. I’m trying my best. At least I haven’t called _you_ a dickhead.” 

“Hey, you agreed with that!” 

Frank turns to look at me from where he’s standing by the door sorting through his mail and I see that he was joking. Whoops. I guess I’m not accustomed to being near people who put up with me. Generally I’m around people who want me to go away, and I can’t say that I blame them. I’m a bit of a downer. Maybe I am Eeyore.

It’s getting late now, but I’m really not all that tired. I’m also pretty bored, but I don’t know what to do or say. I may be a prick, but I still try to respect people a little bit and Frank’s already being nice to me so I shouldn’t ruin that.

“You hungry?” Frank asks walking over to the kitchen. I’m standing awkwardly near the wall, and I don’t know if I should follow or just keep standing here.

“Not really.”

“Too bad,” He says, “because you’re going to eat something.”

“But I’m not-“

“I don’t care,” he says poking his head back to look at me from the kitchen. He looks expectant and I don’t think I could actually avoid his gaze if I tried.

“You didn’t eat lunch so you’re eating dinner. Fucking deal with it.”

I haven’t actually eaten much of anything in a few days, but I protest anyway. Food doesn’t have that much of an appeal to me and it makes me feel kind of weird. Frank isn’t having it though. 

He drags me into the kitchen which doubles as a dining room, and I can’t get a word in edgewise because he’s a talker. 

The kid practically forces a veggie burger down my throat. I’m somewhere stuck in the middle of wanting to punch him in the face and wanting to just suck it up and deal. I really don’t want to be so wretched to him when he’s actually making an effort.

If I’m going to be honest the veggie burger is pretty appalling, but I feel a lot better after I eat. I don’t know if it’s just because Frank was kind of adorable when he did that or if it’s because of the actual act of eating but whatever it is, I feel a bit better. I feel like I’m not actually about to pass out, which is pleasant. 

“There, you ate. Now was that worth fighting with Mikey over?” Frank asks.

“I’m not sure if we were just fighting over that or about my attitude in general, but whatever it was, I’m not really sorry. I didn’t do anything.”

“Really? You’re going with that? It was all his fault and not yours? That’s bullshit. How did you two survive your childhood?”

“Lots of hitting.”

“Well whatever it was, you do realize that you’re an adult who has to take responsibility for things sometimes? It’s an unfortunate stage of growing up, but it is essential if you’re ever going to interact with humans. You can’t just project all the shit onto other people.”

“I’m not a huge fan of interacting with people much to begin with,” I shrug. I don’t really need to be lectured by Frank _again_ today.

“So do I need to worry about the fact that you didn’t want to eat or something?” Frank asks looking all serious out of nowhere.

“What? No. Why?” He doesn’t think I’m starving myself or anything? I honestly don’t think I am I just have trouble getting things down.

“Nothing, I mean. You should have seen how adamant you were. It’s not healthy to not eat. It’ll make you grumpy also so...”

“I’m fine, okay. I just don’t, I don’t know, I don’t really like eating because it’s just more fuel to have to puke out later,” I answer. I’m not sure where I pulled that answer out of, but I realize that it’s actually true. I guess that that had never occurred to me, but it’s true. Avoiding food hasn’t exactly kept me from getting sick recently though so it may not be the best strategy. Especially if it makes me even more sick.

“That’s a miserable way to think.”

“You wouldn’t last a day in my skin,” I answer honestly and frown thinking about how much better of Frank is than I am. For one thing he’s happier than I am, and quite a bit more attractive. He seems like he’s got it all figured out even if he doesn’t.

Frank smiles, “Probably not, but at least I’d be taller.”

“You are really short,” I agree.

“Hey watch it Way! I will end you,” He says.

“If you can reach,” I answer and he kicks me in the shins.

“Fuck off,” he says but smiles. I don’t why but it’s actually pretty cute. Frank is kind of extremely cute. I should say he’s just extremely cute. There’s no ‘kind of’ about him. If I am Eeyore then he is most definitely Winnie the Pooh. 

My phone rings a second later and I look down at the caller ID than feel my heart sink a little bit. I was hoping it’d be Mikey or something, but it’s not. It’s her. She’s like Voldemort at this point because I’m not saying her name.

“I should take this,” I say, solemnly. Frank nods and I walk out of the room. It’s not exactly what I’d call privacy, but it’s better than having him stare at me. There’s no way he can’t hear me but I just ignore that fact.

I answer the phone with an angry, “What do you want?”

“Where are you?”

“Minnesota.”

“No really?” She asks.

I groan and answer, “Yeah, really. I’m in Minnesota.”

“Why would you go back there after you said you hated it there?”

“Well this girl I was dating who I thought was really sweet kicked me out of my apartment after breaking up with me out of nowhere,” that didn’t sound bitter at all. Yeah it did, it sounded so pissed that it doesn’t even deserve sarcasm.

“You’re not still mad about that are you?”

“Still? That was a week ago! I’m still incredibly mad about that,” I answer incredulously.

“Well you shouldn’t be.”

“And why not? How about you tell me why you broke up with me in the first place?”

She doesn’t answer immediately, “I just didn’t think it was going to work.”

“You could’ve mentioned that before we moved in together,” I reply, “Maybe a year ago would’ve been nice.”

“You’re being-“

“You know what? I’m good. I don’t need to hear your crap. I don’t really need you to lecture me on what’s wrong with me. You need to accept the fact that this isn’t going to work. Maybe it would’ve, if you hadn’t decided to throw a bomb at it. I’d say see you later, but I really hope I don’t,” and then I hang up before I can say something even worse.

My head thumps back against the wall and I hear Frank shout from the other room, “see that is one of the many reasons why I don’t date girls.”


	10. Objective: Understand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I guess you could say Frank is Gerard's... anomaly *wink wink, nudge nudge*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don’t mean for this chapter to seem a bit rushed, but I don’t know how I can subtly ease into the plot without getting boring. I have to make some concessions so that I keep myself interested in this story. So I apologize if this seems a little too fast to add emotions, but I have to in order to update this at all.

After three weeks of knowing Frank, it’s getting a little ridiculous. I should not be attracted to this guy. For one thing, I’m trying to focus on being melancholic at the moment, but Frank keeps getting in the way of that. He’s always trying to make me happy, or laugh, and the worst part is that he’s actually fucking good at it. I’m always kind of enjoying myself when he’s there. 

I hate that he makes the fog of emptiness go away, but at the same time it’s refreshing to feel alive again. I’ve been so used to being alone, emotionally and physically that Frank being there is so foreign. It’s not unwelcome. The thing a lot of people don’t get is that when you’re sad, you like being sad. It’s a bit of an oxymoron, but I’m content in being depressed.

Mikey forgave me about five days after the incident, which meant five days at Frank’s house, but I haven’t really known what to do with myself since. I like not having people looking over my shoulder all the time, but I also like living my own life, but I can’t seem to have either because either Mikey is there or Frank is there. I can live my own life with their supervision, or I can live my own life without their supervision and get it anyway. 

Everyone seems to think I’ve got some sort of eating disorder which is sort of pissing me off, because I don’t. I get that the signs may be there, but I’ve just been sick so much lately, that I don’t like to eat. I’m not an idiot, I know that eating disorders are unhealthy and dangerous, and I understand that they’re a problem other people deal with, but I’m positive I don’t have one. They all think that I’m too close to the situation to know myself, but I’m a big boy, I can figure thing out for myself.

Nevertheless everyone is always watching to make sure if I’m eating, to a point where I just suck it up and do.

It’s only been a week since I’ve gone back to a regular dietary schedule and the strange thing is that I’m not as sick as I used to be. For some reason, I’m actually feeling a bit better with people like Frank and Mikey around me. Even Pete doesn’t annoy me as much as he used to. It’s not that I don’t like him, or people in generally, I just can’t stand their welcome opinion of small towns. It bothers me so much so that it effects the way I view their personality.

Frank though... I don’t understand him. He’s kind of an asshole a lot of the time, but I like it. It’s endearing. I’m an asshole most of the time, so it’s pretty impressive that he puts up with me. He’s always at Mikey’s house so I see him practically every day. It’s odd to say, but sometimes it feels like he comes over to see _me_. I know that’s not true, and he’s known my brother longer, but still.

I also find myself _wishing_ he’s here to see me. It’s so weird. He’s my brothers friend, and he’s a guy, and I’m a guy, and he’s gay, but I’m not. Why the fuck does he make my heart jitter when I see him though?

After yet another one of my staple sleepless nights, thoughts of Frank keep invading my dreamless ramblings. I can’t get a moment of peace without thinking about Frank. Mostly it’s thinking about Frank with me. With me in a romantic sense, which is unbelievable.

“I’m not gay,” I whisper to myself under the covers. I’m not. I am not a gay guy. I don’t have anything against it, but it’s never called to me. I’m not into dudes. I like girls. What the hell is going on with me?

~*~*~*~

“You’ve been giving me funny looks all day. Spill it, Way. What’s up?

“Uh, nothing,” I reply to Frank. He’s starting to suspect something. I don’t know what he’s suspecting, because we both know I’m straight. Am I even fucking straight? Frank’s existence seems to contradict that.

“Yeah, nothing,” he mocks, “you don’t like me do you?”

“What?” I ask, considerably surprised. “That’s definitely not it. Definitely, trust me. I mean, you’re kind of a dickhead, but you seem like a niceish person. A little rude, but who isn’t?”

“Niceish? You Way’s are really good with compliments,” Frank says.

“Yeah we give compliment sandwiches. Insult, followed by a compliment, and then another insult. It helps compose the unfriendly façade that people cast upon us,” I say.

“No that’s not it. Mikey I like, it’s you I’m not too sure about,” he jokes.

“Where is Mikey anyway?” I ask. It’s weird that I’m in his house, but I haven’t even seen him all day.

“You probably don’t want to hear the answer seeing as he is your brother,” Frank says.

“He’s still in bed, isn’t he?” I ask, feeling a little grossed out.

“Yep,” Frank says. “They have a schedule for things like that. They don’t know they do, but you pick up on it after a while.”

“Yeah, please spare me the details. I know that much though. During the six months that he lived with me, I almost couldn’t believe how habitual he was. Mikey doesn’t even know how predictable he is.”

“Wait, Mikey lived in New York with you?” Frank asks completely incredulous. 

“Yeah for a little while. Just for a few months.”

“Why? He loves it here, what about Pete?”

“Pete stayed here. Mikey was trying to... ugh,” I stop, and try to veer away from the subject. “Frank there are a lot of things I’ve done in my life that I’m not so proud of, and I don’t know what you’d think of me if you knew about some of them.”

“I already don’t like you much, so there’s nothing to really lose. I’m kidding of course, I get it, but how was Mikey involved?”

I shrug and tell him, “He was trying to help me.”

Frank doesn’t say anything for a few minutes and then sighs and looks at me seriously. Uh oh, not a good look to get. Frank’s a smart guy, it wouldn’t surprise me if he’s already figured it out.

“Can I ask you a question that you have every right not to answer?”

“Um, sure?” I say, but part of me knows what he’s about to say.

“Well, I can’t help but pick up on some things, okay? When Mikey told me his brother was coming into town a month ago, he said to tip toe around you. Then I come over here and he tells me that he’s not buying any beer for a while. Everyone’s always asking if you were drunk and shit. Did you, or do you... uh-“

“Yeah,” I say, getting his point. “It was a long time ago. I’m okay now, mostly, but Mikey is a little over precautious.”

He really is a smart guy. Maybe he’s just really observant, but he keeps on knowing things about me. He knows the kind of things that people wouldn’t tell him, but a person can decipher on their own, if they know where to look. Frank always seems to know where to look to understand me, and it’s odd. I didn’t know I was that readable, but Frank is a contradiction to everything I thought I knew.

“So you were, like, an alcoholic?” He clarifies.

“Mhm. People are always trying to dance around that word. I mean it’s not like it scares me, it is a word, and I was one. Still am I guess, it never really goes away.”

“Wow, okay. Sorry if I’m-“

“No it’s fine. I thought we’d established that I don’t like people trying to be sensitive, it’s just demeaning. I am what I am. Brevity is for the weak,” I say.

“You’re the strangest person I’ve ever met,” Frank says with a tilt of the head and then he goes back to casually talking about music. He does that a lot. Changes the subject in the middle of a conversation. It’s cute. He’s cute. And I’m supposed to be straight.

I’ve known him for three weeks, I should not like him this much after that little a period. I also shouldn’t like him the way I do. I don’t want to sound like a teenage girl, but I _like_ like him. This is so insane. 

It’s not that I like any other guys, it’s just Frank. Why Frank? He’s been nothing but harshly brutal to me in nothing but his words. Typically you’re supposed to hate people who are so imposing, but Frank isn’t mean about it. 

He also does his best to maintain boundaries. He leaves things alone that need to be left alone, like what that doctor said. I can tell whenever he’s hinting about it, but as soon as I make it clear that the topic is not up for discussion, he backs off. I can tell he’s worried about me though, because everyone is these days. I’ve become used to detecting that. It’s not so much a question of who is wary of me, it’s a question of how wary they are.

“I don’t understand you, Frank.”

“In what way?” He asks looking amused.

“I’m not sure yet,” I say.

“Well tell me when you are sure.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ll tell you this one thing though, if you’re okay with another kind of big time gap between this and the next chapter, then I can assure you MUCH quicker updates.


	11. Destination: (Fuck It) Frank's House Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time for this story to make a comeback.

I’ve got a crush on a dude which is weird because I’m a straight guy. No, I’m not bisexual, or questioning, or gay, or anything, I’m straight. I just like a dude, which contradicts my straightness, but I am straight. I am positive of that much. I just really want to make out with this one guy who has, like, a dick.

Frank is a guy, and I am a guy, and I am straight, but I have a crush on Frank who is gay. I can say it all I want but I’m sure my math is right, I just don’t get it. I’m confusing the shit out of myself.

I’m not exactly of the best mental stability in my life, so maybe it’s because of the pressure of my world falling apart around me that’s got me feeling like this, but I really want to date Frank or something? Maybe it’s just my curiosity being blown out of proportions by the fact that I’ve managed to find a gay guy who is physically attractive and short on prey. He’s in a town which is scarce in the department of single homosexuals, and maybe I’m just curious. If I’m just curious then why do I have the lingering thirst to stick my tongue in his mouth?

Mikey is busying himself with something in the kitchen when I ask him a question that I didn’t intend to actually ask, “Hey Mikes is it weird that I find your friend Frank attractive?”

“Well Frank _is_ attractive so I’m going to have to go with no,” Mikey replies.

“Yeah but I’m not gay. I don’t like guys, but I think he’s good looking,” I say.

“So? I find Scarlett Johansson attractive, but you don’t see me kicking up a fuss.”

“I guess you’re right,” I concede.

“’Course I am, I’ve always been the smart one,” Mikey says smiling.

“And the arrogant one,” I say, laughing at him, even though his form of haughty is just a tilt of the head.

“You say arrogant, I say confident,” Mikey answers.

It’s quiet for a few minutes before Mikey says, “Are you going to do anything about it?”

“About what?”

“Your shameless crush on Frank,” Mikey says, like it’s an everyday topic that people just talk about.

“Wait, who has a shameless crush on Frank?” A voice asks, and Pete enters the room with a broad grin.

“Gerard does,” Mikey says.

“I don’t. Not a shameless crush. Not even a crush. I find him physically appealing,” I say.

“You have a big gay crush on Frank,” Mikey says, angling his eyes to look at me judgingly.

“I thought you were straight,” Pete says.

“I am straight!”

“You’re crush on Frank would suggest otherwise,” Pete replies.

What the fuck are they doing to me, it’s like I’m being ganged up on.

“I do not have a _crush_ on Frank,” I repeat, “and I’m not gay either. I just think he’s good looking. I also think that Matt Damon is good looking, so sue me.”

“Everyone thinks Matt Damon is good looking, bro,” Mikey says, and Pete turns to give me this really serious face and nods.

“God, think whatever the fuck you want. I’m going to Frank house,” I say.

“To stick your tongue down his throat?” Mikey asks.

“Remind me to never tell you anything of importance ever again. Ever. You two are awful.”

Mikey gives me a devilish smile before I throw the door closed and walk over to my car. I guess it’s become a routine with me. Frank is always at Mikey’s house, and if he’s not I’ll just find myself over at his. He’s really convivial, but also exceedingly trenchant. It’s actually rather disarming.

Somehow we always end up talking about really strange things that normal people don’t talk about. There’s a tacit atmosphere that when I’m in Frank’s house, I’m not pretending to be anyone. He doesn’t let me, he’ll call me out on my bullshit if he even gets a hint of it. Maybe that’s why I’m drawn to him, because he’s the polar opposite of the people I usually talk to. Everyone is always walking on broken glass around me, but I’m not a child deserving of your sense of fragility. I’m a fucking human whose head isn’t screwed on properly.

“See the thing is that I’m wondering why you moved to a town with no, like, guys. Like, there’s no one to really fall in love with or anything so why did you come here?”

“Well my life does not revolve round my sex life, strange as it seems,” Frank starts.

“You know that’s not what I meant.”

“Yeah I know, I’m just teasing you,” He says smiling, “I mean I guess I just wanted something new. I’ll go back someday, maybe. Probably. I’m still young though, I have time to find someone, or no one at all. I guess it just depends on how the cards play out.”

“So you don’t care?”

“I’ve got a long life to live, and I think I want to try doing it by myself before I find someone to share it with. Now that’s not to say that I’d ever say no to it, if I was handed someone really amazing, but I’m not really looking right now. I’ve set my line, but I’m not really watching it or anything. If I happen to catch a fish then that’s great, but it’s not essential right now.”

“You have a way with words. You could be a poet,” I say fondly.

“You know who has a way with words is Pete,” Frank says.

“Yep Pete’s good with words. He was a poet in high school. Got a lot of praise for some of it,” I say.

“Really?” Frank asks, looking like I just told him something really juicy. “God, I just love hearing people in this town talk about each other. Like you all know each other. You’re all acquainted and shit. It’s really nice, and I like the way you all seem like a big family.”

“Ugh, that’s one of the things I hate. I hate people thinking they know me. I’ve always hated this town, but you already know that.”

“Yeah, I get it. You seem like you really were miserable, Gerard. I haven’t seen that as much though. Granted, I’ve only known you for a little while, but it seems like you’re getting better.”

I shrug, “Ironic, because the source of my disparity is this godforsaken town.”

“Are you sure about that? I feel like this town is making you better. I think seeing Mikey and all your old friends is really making a difference.”

“Well you don’t know me very well. Not at my best. God, I hate it here. It’s not as bad as it used to be, but I do. Before I moved away from this town, I couldn’t even bring myself to get out of bed. I just sort of stayed in all the time like a fucking hermit, and watched Friends reruns. It was torture,” I reply.

“But was it the town doing that to you, or was it you telling yourself that it was the town, because you didn’t want to blame yourself,” Frank asks.

“Please, for god’s sake don’t get all ‘therapist’ on me, Frank.”

“No I’m not trying to, I just don’t think a town can have that kind of power on someone. You seen Elizabethtown?”

“The movie?” I ask, “no, why?”

“Well it’s just that the character in that movie, goes to this town determined to hate it, and convinces himself he does, but he finds his catalyst and it makes him better, and feel a little happier about where he’s ended up. Maybe Mikey is your catalyst.”

Yeah or maybe Frank is my catalyst.

“There’s so many movies about going back home though, and finding some long lost love from your childhood or whatever, why do I have to follow that?”

Frank shrugs, “Maybe you should. Look, we’ve all been through a bad breakup, and when you’re already sad, it’s probably a million times worse so maybe a little romance isn’t a bad idea for you. I’m not saying you need a rebound, besides I think it’s been long enough now for you to consider it a step back into the world.”

“I think I’ll hold off, I’m a little confused with what I’m doing right now. I don’t have a job, or a proper house, and I’m living with my brother. It’s just not right for me right now,” and I have a crush on a dude. So what if I told Mikey and Pete it wasn’t a real crush? I can keep my own secrets.

“I guess we’re both just hopeless duds in the dating game, aren’t we?” Frank sighs.

“Well at least we can derive our excuse from the state of this town,” I say.

“That is called deflection.”

“I deflect a lot of things, I think this is one thing that you can just let slide. I don’t need another person to make me feel whole again,” I say, surprised that the insinuation is that I’m in need of a partner to make me feel better.

“I never intended for you to take my meaning like that, I just think that everything is always a little brighter when you have someone to share it with. Like, you don’t go to the movies by yourself. You don’t go to dinner by yourself. You don’t dance by yourself,” Frank says.

“So what? I need someone to dance with?”

“You need someone who you’re happy to just dance with,” Frank says, “mind you, I could use someone like that as well.”

“So you’re telling me to base my love life off of a Beatles song?”

“If you want to get technical, yes,” Frank says. “Someone whose hand you want to hold would work too.”

I frown, looking at Frank’s hand for a moment before realizing what I’m doing.

“Look, I’m a bit corny today,” Frank says, “I watched a bunch of chick flicks last night, Nick and Norah among those chick flicks, and I could honestly give you the whole damn quote about the Beatles being dead on, but you know the shtick. Don’t tire yourself trying to find someone though, just let yourself go with the flow.”

“You’re such a sap,” I say rolling my eyes.

“Yeah, but which one of us is frowning here,” Frank points out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have you seen the film Silver Lining’s Playbook? I think the great thing about that film is that the whole thing makes you feel like you’re in the head of a person with Bipolar disorder. I think people might construe it as melodramatics who aren’t familiar with how that distorts a mind, but it’s true, that film is pretty realistic. A lot of this story is trying to emanate that vibe, so if any of it comes across as a little farfetched then I want you to realize that you’re living it through the mind of someone who sees life a little more dramatically.


	12. Objective: Go For It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Subtlety has never been Gerard’s strong point.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You're not going to like this one.

I know it’s going to be a bad day just by the feeling in my gut, but I try to shove that away, because I like pretending I’m not fucked up. I am though, and I can feel it, coming up like a hurricane. It’s worse than a hurricane though, because no one can see it so they don’t understand just how painful it is.

For some reason Frank is more attractive today. Maybe it’s because I feel like hiding under the sheets in my bed, but he’s still really pretty. He doesn’t look any different though, so it’s probably in my head.

I don’t know what comes over me, but I just can’t stop myself. It’s like my whole body is fighting it and then it catches me off guard and I go for it. I turn to Frank and I kiss him, and I feel awful about not warning him, but I really needed this. I need to kiss him.

He yelps in surprise and then falls limp for a minute. He seems to realize what’s happening then, and puts his hand on my chin to push me away from his lips, but to keep me close.

“You’re straight,” he states and his eyes look more than confused.

“I know,” I whimper regretfully.

“So what was...?” he looks so lost. I’m about five inches away from him now with his hand still on my chin and his touch feels like liquid fire.

“I’m really not sure,” I admit.

He gulps trying to form words and then says, “Gerard do you like me? Like, do you _like_ me?

I don’t know what to say other than, “yeah.”

He looks even more muddled by that answer and tries to shake the confusion away while looking everywhere and nowhere at all. He takes a minute, but then looks back at me and then stares down at his hand that’s still under my chin. He turns pink before my eyes and then pulls his hand away.

He looks unsure of himself and looks down at his knees with his face a mixture of fear and innocence. 

I feel wretched now, I just ruined the poor kid’s life! He looks so upset, and it’s my fault. I should’ve been stronger. I should’ve controlled myself. I just messed up whatever friendship we were having, and I feel nauseous at the whole thing.

“Oh my god,” I say on the verge of panicking, “I am so sorry. I can’t believe... I mean, I just ruined everything. Shit!”

“What?” Frank asks, and he looks surprised to see me sitting here.

“I’m so sorry. I’m such a fuckup. I completely-” I shake my head not able to find words to describe how badly I screwed up, and I jump up to my feet, “I’ll leave. Oh god, you probably hate me!”

“What?” He asks looking so beyond confused that it’s almost like he’s trying to remember his own name, “What’s going on? I- just, gah! I’m not getting something here.”

I don’t know what to say in return. He stands up to be a little closer to eye level with me and he looks imploringly at me, making my stomach churn with dread. I can’t believe I managed to make Frank so distraught.

“You don’t like guys,” Frank says trying to piece things together, and he uses his hands to try and make himself see the picture better, “but I’m a guy, and you like me?”

I don’t nod or do anything, but he looks at me like he’s trying to answer the hardest question in the universe.

“How does that work?” He asks.

“I don’t,” I say trying to grasp the concept myself, “I just don’t know.”

“Is it because I’m gay that you like me?” He asks.

“No!” I say quickly.

“Well then why? How does a straight guy like another guy?”

“I don’t know! Okay?” It comes out a little angrier than I’d intended, “I just do.”

“But,” he makes a groaning sound and I understand it completely. It’s just a noise that means, ‘what?’ with as much exasperation as you can possibly put behind that one word.

“I’ll just... I’ll just leave. I’m so sorry Frank.”

I turn slightly but Frank grabs my shoulder, “why do you think I hate you?”

“Because,” it’s actually a lot harder to find a reason than I thought, “because you don’t like me back, and I kissed you. That was wrong!”

“It was like a mistake or something? A momentary break? Why would that make me hate you?”

“You don’t hate me?” I ask.

“Well, I don’t think I do,” he answers blatantly.

“But you don’t actually like me?” I say knowing the answer before he says it.

“Well I don’t know. I never, I mean, I never considered it. I’ve never thought about you, because _you’re straight_.”

I take that as a no and feel almost ready to cry or something. I don’t know why. His rejection hurts more than it should. I was already feeling like shit, this is just the last straw.

“Are you sure you’re not gay? Or bi, at least?” He asks.

“I’m positive. It’s just you, Frank. You’re the only guy I’ve ever felt legitimately attracted to,” I answer him with certainty.

“Okay,” he nods looking a little calmer now and almost fascinated by the predicament, which is a stunningly odd look concerning the situation.

“What is going on with you Frank?” I ask after it’s almost two minutes and he hasn’t said a word. He’s looking at the wall behind me, and his hand is still on my shoulder.

“I’m trying to figure something out,” he answers, blankly.

It takes another few minutes. The most painfully long minutes of my entire life. My eyes don’t waver from looking at him, and his eyes are trained on the wall just as mine are on him.

“Okay,” he says finally and looks up at me looking resolved. I don’t know what to ask, so I don’t ask anything, and I let him look at me for a few moments before he speaks again.

“Okay Gerard, I think I understand now,” it took him that long to figure out what’s going on?

“And?”

“And what? I just said I understand.”

“Well are you mad at me?”

“No,” he says looking concerned that I’d even think that, “I’m okay with it. I just needed to get it straight in my head.”

“I need to get straight in my head,” I answer back with utter desperation.

“What? Gerard, no one is mad at you for being confused. You’re at a crossroads, I get that. Why do you think you need to change yourself?”

“Because you’re not attracted to me, and I just made an idiot of-”

“You’re putting words in my mouth, Gerard. I never said that!”

“So you are attracted to me?” I ask skeptically.

“I didn’t say that either,” he replies, “Look Gerard, I’m just a little frazzled right now. I don’t know how I feel about you. I just need some time to think.”

That’s a no. It’s a soft no, but it’s a definite no. That’s his way of gently telling me it’s never going to happen, I just _know_ that that’s what he means.

“I need to get away from you,” I shake my head trying to sort things out, and I brush his hand off my shoulder, “I just need to get away from you.”

“What?” He looks completely surprised.

“You’re confusing me Frank! I’m straight. I can’t like you, that’s not how this works!” I turn away and walk over the carpet quickly, hearing him follow behind.

“Gerard stop, I haven’t given you an answer!”

“Frank this is bad. This is wrong, I just can’t see you.”

“Can’t see me right now or at all?”

I frown, realizing now that I have made it to the entrance with my fingers around the door handle, “At all, Frank. You’re confusing the shit out of me and it’s scary.”

He looks devastated by my answer, but I know it’s the right thing to say, “No, please-”

“I can’t be near you Frank! I just... I’ve got to go,” I say and I pull the door open, then step out into the groggy night. The mosquitoes swarm around me as soon as I step into the fresh air and speed walk over to my car.

“Gerard wait!” Frank yells, running to catch up behind me, but I just walk quicker and pull open my door. Frank’s hand appears behind me and slams the door closed, so I turn to look at him, pleading for him to just let me leave.

“Frank, let me go,” I say trying to sound stern.

“No! Not with you thinking I’m mad at you or something!”

“I don’t think you’re mad, just please, let me go!”

“Stop this Gerard, you’re acting like a child.”

I exhale trying not to get angry with him, “Frank I don’t want to be around you. I don’t want to like you. I hate myself for liking you.”

Frank looks hurt when I say this and that provides me enough of a distraction to pull the door open and situate myself inside. Frank recovers a moment too late because I lock the door and he knocks furiously on the window. I feel like the worst person in the world, I kind of _am_ the worst person in the world. I sit here for a minute trying to keep myself from crying before I finally turn the key in the ignition. I hear Frank’s pounding for me to stop so I look at him through the window, and he looks like I just stabbed him. It hurts to see that face so broken and I put my hand on the wheel. At this, however, his face turns instantly into fury and he steps in front of my car.

I want to just sit there and cry but I don’t do that I just slump in my seat and mentally beg him to let me go.

He looks at me through the front window and I can feels his ample rage in his eyes. I open the window, tentatively not wanting to let the mosquitoes in, but I do anyway.

“Would you please move Frank?” I plea.

“No, Gerard! You’re acting so childish. I want you to look at what you’re doing,” he shouts back at me, not moving.

“I’m scared of myself around you, Frank. I’m not into guys, and then there’s you, and it’s really terrifying. I need to get away from you!”

“What’s so wrong with liking me?” he asks defensively.

“Nothing, that’s the point, Frank! You’re perfect, and sweet, and you fucking put up with me. It’s not okay for me to like you though, because I’m so messed up. I am so stuck in this shit, and I can’t be gay as well. I can’t like another guy,” I say, and it sounds so rude when the words actually come out of my mouth.

“Being gay is wrong?” He asks harshly.

“You know I don’t think that, but for me it’s not right. That’s why I can’t be around you.”

“Running away from me isn’t going to solve your problems. It’s not going to make anything seem clear. Running away now will only make things worse tomorrow. It’ll make tomorrow so much worse and harder to live.”

“I can’t get over this feeling though while I’m with you!” I say.

He looks so disappointed in that answer and walks over to my window to look at me, “who says you need to get over it?”

I shake my head, and look at the steering wheel under my fingertips, “I’m sorry, Frank.”

That’s all I say before I just pull the car quickly away from him, and forward away from his house.

For five minutes all I try to do is keep myself from crying. I just need to make it to Mikey’s and then I can let myself fall apart. I breathe heavily, and start feeling worse about myself for what I just did to Frank, but I send the thought away until I can collapse.

It’s the longest car ride of my life. I’m there in under ten minutes, but each second of every minute is a century long. My heart feels like it’s been shoved into a trash compacter and my whole chest feels like it’s been bound tightly so that I can barely breathe.

Eventually though I do pull up to the house, and I stumble out of the car, feeling a headache coming on.

I walk forward, as if dying, to the front door, and pull it open. I had intended to make it up stairs before collapsing, I really did. As soon as the door is closed behind me though I collapse against it and slide down the door into a sitting position, with my knees pulled in, only a few inches from my face.

I don’t even attempt to hold back my tears, because as soon as I fall to the floor my chest aches even more like no pain I’ve ever felt before. Everything hurts. I just let my head fall onto my knees and then I’m balling. I’m sure I’ve cried this hard before, but I can’t remember when. I’ve just ruined everything. Everything that was starting to be good in my life and I had to go and mess it up. I’m not sure what time it is but it’s got to be sometime past midnight so I feel even worse. I’m a mess.

“Gerard?” Mikey’s voice asks with fear, and I hear pounding footsteps as he hurries down the stairs.

I don’t look up at him but I’m aware that he’s standing over me and then crouches down quickly by my side and wraps an arm around my shoulder.

“Oh god, Gerard,” he says, and I feel his forehead fall onto my shoulder with complete sympathy. He doesn’t ask what’s wrong and I appreciate that greatly, he just lets me cry for a long time, and I look up long enough to see Pete looking at me and my brother. He’s either completely scared or concerned.

It becomes so hard to stop once I stared though and I hear my own wheezing as every breath becomes a battle against my body.

I honestly don’t know how long it’s been. I don’t even have a good guess. I literally haven’t the slightest idea. 

Pete walks over to me and crouches down in front of me, holding out a glass of water, but I wave it away and he sets it down on the living room table next to him. They’re both wearing their pajamas so I must have woken them up, and that’s just another thing to stack on this list of horrible things I’ve done today.

“Gee, you need to drink something or you’ll dehydrate yourself,” Mikey says. His head is still on my shoulder and I know how awful I must be right now, but I just. can’t. stop. 

I shake my head turning down the thought, but Mikey sighs and grabs the water anyway.

“Please just take a sip,” he pleads and I inhale trying to stop the tears. It doesn’t work, but I grab the water anyway. It’s hard to take a sip when I’m crying but I finally bring it to my mouth, and then find myself draining the glass. I didn’t know I was even that thirsty, but Mikey sighs with relief after I finish the water off.

“Pete, can you make yourself scarce for a minute? I need to bring my brother upstairs,” Mikey says. I like Pete, I really do, but Mikey seems to know that I don’t really want him here right now. Pete’s not offended so he walks over to the kitchen and busies himself with something while Mikey pulls me up and drags me up the stairs slowly.

He finally gets me into my room and sits down on the bed with me, but I can’t stop crying.

“Do you need anything or do you just want me to leave so you can get some sleep?” he asks.

I don’t respond immediately, and I’m not sure I have a voice anymore anyway.

“Sleep?” he asks, and I nod.

His arm that is still around my back, rubs my shoulder soothingly and he sighs, “Will you promise that you’re going to go to sleep then? Don’t torture yourself, just get some rest and calm down.”

I nod resolutely and he looks nervous to leave me on my own, but he stands up anyway. He still gives me a painful look that I’m far too used to.

“I love you Gee, just be safe,” Mikey says, and he walks over to the door, “see you in the morning.”

I hear the click of the door closing and fall back on the bed. I’m still sobbing slightly, but it’s starting to hurt my stomach and my eyes feel painfully heavy. I sniffle a few times, and try to calm down, but my head is throbbing agonizingly.

That’s all I know before I’m unconscious.


	13. Destination: Back to the Place Where It All Began

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just sit back and relapse again.

“Mikes how’d you, uh,” I stumble on my words not knowing how to phrase this, “how’d you know you were, uh, gay?”

Mikey looks surprised by the question, but I don’t blame him.

“Um well, I don’t know, I just kind of figured it out.”

“No, but explain,” I ask.

“Um, okay. I’m going to sound so generic and textbook, but basically I always knew it, I just didn’t realize until a little later on what that meant for me. From the age when you start liking people, sometime around fourth or fifth grade, I knew I was into guys. The question became not about whether I liked guys, but how straight was I? I decided for a while that I was bisexual, if you remember that, in seventh grade, and then I just kind of realized I really couldn’t care less about the female gender. It took a lot of soul searching, but it’s always been something I just knew.”

I nod, not completely soothed by the answer like I hoped I would be.

“What’s up Gerard? You weren’t crying last night because you thought...” he looks nervous.

“No, er, I don’t even know anymore,” I decide to just be blunt with him, he’s my brother and he might be able to help, “Mikey, I like Frank.”

“You like Frank,” he repeats looking confused, “You said that yesterday. What do you really mean?”

“What I mean is that I’m not gay. You know that I’m not gay, I know that I’m not gay, Frank knows that I’m not gay, and everyone else does too. I’ve always been comfortable with my sexuality because I was always sure that I was straight, because I knew I didn’t like guys.”

“You’re speaking in the past tense,” Mikey says looking curious.

“I know I am. I like Frank, and I don’t know why. I’m not gay, but then there’s Frank, and I don’t know what I think anymore.”

“Oh so you _like_ Frank,” Mikey says, finally understanding.

“Yes, and now I just don’t... I don’t know what’s going on anymore.”

“So, do the events of last night tie into your liking Frank?” Mikey asks looking nervous that he’s overstepping his boundaries.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I answer.

“That’s fair, but I need to know if you’re okay Gerard. _Are_ you okay?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’m not asking for details I just need to know that you’re okay.”

“I don’t know, Mikes. That’s all I can say. I feel like I’ve been shot in the chest and now I’m just waiting to bleed out.”

“That’s not okay,” Mikey says, “I have to run a few errands, but if you need me to, I’ll stay here.”

“No, it’s fine. Do what you have to do, I’m just. I’m fine, honestly.”

“You said it feels like you’re bleeding out,” Mikey points out.

“But I don’t need a babysitter. I can take care of myself,” I answer stubbornly, and a little angrily. I don’t mean to, but I just say the words, and now it’s too late to take them back.

~*~*~*~

I walk into the little shop that, ten years ago, had been my downfall. This store had given me everything I’d ever wanted and it ruined my life. Why the hell am I back?

“Nuh uh. Nope Gerard, I’m not allowed to sell you anything,” the guy behind the counter says, a guy who’d been in the grade below me at school.

“What?” I ask him confused.

“Mikey told me explicitly that if you ever came here again, I would only let you buy anything over my cold dead body,” he says. I don’t remember his name, so I don’t know how to address him.

“I’m not a little kid, I can get whatever I want.”

“It’s not going to happen,” He says.

I groan, “Listen, my _little brother_ doesn’t control me. You don’t control me, and I will do whatever the hell I want.”

“Why don’t you let me call Mikey and I’ll tell him what you said,” the guy says.

“You’re such an asshole,” I whisper, “Fine. Call Mikey, I don’t care. But I have to do something _wrong_ before you do that.”

I look at him daringly, and grab a six pack. 

“I’m not ringing you up,” he says.

“Then I’ll let you keep the change,” I say and I set a wad of cash, probably around forty bucks, onto the counter.

“Gerard, please just-”

“I want to get wasted and there’s nothing you are going to say that’s going to stop me from doing that,” I say. I stare at him daring him to stop me for a few seconds with my eyes, and when he doesn’t move I walk away, and out through the door.

I get into my car and drive away before he can stop me. He’s going to call Mikey I’m sure, but Mikey can’t get me if he doesn’t know where I am. I know precisely where I want to go.

It’s been so long since I last went there that I almost forget the way. 

Fifty years ago or maybe more, there was a little pond just outside of town. The little pond was hidden by a clump of trees so most people didn’t know about it, but there were some people who decided to build a little park right next to it. They never finished it before they realized how stupid an idea it was. Mosquitoes are attracted to water, everybody knows that, but when commissioning this specific park they didn’t factor that in, so they were halfway through when they realized that the entire park was going to be swarmed with bugs come summer.

They only ever built a basketball court and started on a swing set, and then it was abandoned. The place might look eerie to most people, but it was my hideout from the ages of fourteen until I left for school. The pond dried up before I ever discovered the place, but I learned about its existence from old newspapers. It never got finished though, even after the mosquito problem became nonexistent. 

It’s not a far walk and you can’t get to the park by car, so I park a little outside of town, making sure to hide my car where you won’t see it if you drive by. I then walk through the overgrown grass, yellowing with dryness, and forward a little ways to the basketball court with my alcohol in tow.

The second I see it through the cover of trees I warm up a little inside. I’ve actually missed this place, which makes no sense. I hate this town, but I love this small little patch of nothing. There’s barely anything here, and for some reason that’s what makes it great.

The tarmac is being reclaimed by nature so that there are weeds growing between several of the cracks. The sides of the blacktop are crumbling with age as well, and the foliage has deep roots that are dividing holes into the landscape all around me. The basketball hoop, which is slightly crooked and missing the net itself, but the rim is still there and solid as ever. The backboard looks dirtied but no different than from when I last saw it, and the entire closure is wild looking. 

The half of the paddock facing town is hidden by the trees, while the other side is hilled by a wide expanse of nothing. All the farms in town are on the other side, so this really is deserted. You can see the outline for where a pond could have once been, because the grass is dirtier and less prominent then in other places.

There is one difference to this place that stands out to me, and it’s so insignificant that most people wouldn’t notice. As it is I only notice because it doesn’t make sense to me.

The chalk lines on the blacktop are more defined and noticeable than I’ve ever seen them. The white lines aren’t perfect, but it’s obvious that they’ve been redone since I was last here, because there are now obvious barriers and zones on the surface, which as far as I know, are completely new. 

This means someone else has been here recently. I turn back to look at the overgrowth behind me and realize now that there’s also considerable signs of a path. Not noticeable unless you’re looking for it, but there is a matted down little line that is too distinct to have been made just now by myself. Someone’s trudged a few times through here. I don’t know how old this path is though, because it could still be a year old and I wouldn’t be able to tell. 

I set my beer on the tarmac, and I back track to go and study it. The gruff is entangled and I can’t see any distinct footprints so I have no context to guess who made them. I do spot a bright object to the side though, so I crane my neck to see a basketball hidden precariously in the grass.

I walk over to it and prod my foot against the ball. It’s fully inflated, no give. Someone’s been here within this month, but probably more recently. Creepy.

I let that go for now and sit down against the basketball hoop which teeters slightly when I lean against it, but not enough for me to worry about it. Then I uncap a beer.


	14. Objective: Too Fucked Up To Have An Objective

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure how I feel about this. I'm not sure I'm happy with it. I don't want to upload it because of this hesitation, but I am. You're not going to like it in any case.

When I wake up its well past midnight. I rub my eyes and feel the stiff concrete under my back, having provided a truly uncomfortable position. My body hasn’t felt this stiff and painful in years, but I get up and look at the wreck around me. So that wasn’t a dream then. I did get myself wasted in the middle of the afternoon.

I fucking hate myself. How could I do that? Well the answer is probably _because_ I fucking hate myself. How redundant is that? It’s such a stupid cycle. I hate myself so I drink to make me forget about it which only makes it worse in the long run. I fucking hate myself.

Mikey’s going to kill me.

Pete’s going to kill me.

My parents are going to kill me.

Mostly though, Mikey is going to kill me. He’s going to kill me a few times, and then for good measure, throw me off a bridge. I don’t even blame him. If I were him, I’d kill me to.

I mean, at least I didn’t drive or anything.

I check my watch, but it’s too dark to see it in the dark. It’s very dark outside, almost no light at all, like I’ve woken up in a cave. I haven’t though, I see the moon and the stars. The stars are very bright, but I’ve got a killer headache so looking at them hurts my eyes. I am so glad that’s not the sun, or I’d be a vampire screaming and howling on the ground. I don’t know how long I was out for, though if I recall, it was before noon that I got here. It’s been probably over twelve hours.

When I stumble back to the car in complete darkness, I almost lose my way, and actually feel a little scared. I don’t have my phone with me so I don’t have any light to guide me to my car, other than the light from the moon. I trip on a root, and scoff my elbow up a bit, but I pull myself back up and bat at the mosquitoes swarming around me. It’s unnaturally dark, but I find my way anyway.

The minute I see my car is not because of the moon though, it’s because of a blue light emitting from inside. I walk a little quicker, though my joints scream at me, to see the light of my phone blaring into the dark car to tell me I have an incoming call.

My stomach drops. I am in _so much trouble_.

Mikey is a million times more terrifying than my parents. Oh god, this is going to be a really rough few days. Mikey is going to kill me, then scream at me, then kill me, then tell me off for drinking, then kill me, and then he’s going to kill me. I honestly cannot even imagine a time where Mikey has been as mad as he is about to be.

I pull open the car door and pick up the phone, but I don’t answer the call. I just let it go to voice mail. I’d rather do the whole screaming thing in person.

When the call stops, I’m shown the number of the missed calls I’ve received, and my heart practically stops at the number. I hope to god it’s a glitch.

Oh god, Mikey is going to _kill_ me.

My phone has received so many phone calls that it doesn’t even say how many. All it says is 100+ which is undeniably terrifying. I scroll down to see that I’ve also got 100+ text messages and a grand total of 33 voice messages.

It’s been well over twelve hours though. I don’t know what I expected. Given the situation, it makes sense.

The phone calls are from a range of people, mostly Mikey but Pete, and my parents as well. I’m also surprised to see Frank on the list of missed calls, but I do not want to talk to him right now. Or ever.

I check some of the texts though.

Mikey: I just got a call from the liquor store. DO NOT DRINK ANYTHING

Mikey: PICK UP YOUR DAMN PHONE

Mikey: The next tiem I see you I’m gonna kill u

Mikey: Where r u?

Mikey: Please answer me

Mikey: Gee please pick up

Mikey: I’m not mad please just pick up.

Mikey: PICK UP PICK UP PICK UP

Mikey: don’’t kill yourself

They get increasingly more desperate as I scroll down. A mixture of Pete is in there telling me that Mikey is panicking, and that he’s ready to send out a search party. Pete’s mostly angry that I scared Mikey at first, and then he gets to be nearly as desperate as Mikey. Nearly. He’s no competition for the pain in Mikey’s texts.

There’s two from Frank as well. My heart stops when I see his name, and I don’t know what to do. I have to read them, but I’m scared.

Frank: I want to talk.

Frank: Mikey says you’ve gone missin. If this is bcause of me please take it out on me and not M,ikey

A little further on are some really dark texts from Mikey and Pete.

Mikey: I’m rotting here w/o knowing whats wrong!

Mikey: ten hours Gerard, what am I supossed to think?

Mikey: what if ur dead?

Mikey: what if ur dead and ur not going to read these at all

Mikey: Do u see how scared I am? 

Mikey: talk to me. stay safe. i’m not mad.

Mikey: I dont even know if ur dead. plese dont b dead

Mikey: I love u so much Gee, answer me!

Pete: Mikey is convinced ur dead. I beg u with everything in the world to please just come home!

Mikey: twelve hours.

Mikey: g, I dont wanna believe tht ur dead bu t I also cant beleive that ur alive right now until u answer me

Mikey: Schrodinger’s Gerard

Mikey: u know, normaly u’d have found that funny, but ur not texting back

Mikey: oh god text back

Mikey: i dont cre what happend just tell me ur not dead

Pete: Please Gerard!

Mikey: what am I gonna do if ur dead?

Mikey: I fuCKING HATE YOU wHERE ARE YOU?

Mikey: please

Mikey: Come home please. I need u to know I love you, and im not mad

My heart feels broken as I read through some of them. It never even occurred to me that Mikey would think I’m dead.

I receive a voice message just as I’m reading through some of the texts, but I blaze through most of them without reading the contents. I decide to listen to it because it’s the most current update on Mikey’s predicament right now.

“Gerard please, wherever you are, stop ignoring me,” he says and his voice sounds raw from crying, “Please come home. I don’t even know if you’re alive right now, Gerard. You have no idea how scared I am. Please just tell me you’re okay. Please. I love you so much. I need to know you’re alive Gerard. I’ve never been more scared. _Come home_.”

He’s still going to kill me even if he says he’s not mad. I frown, my whole body shaking, because I don’t know what to do.

It takes me a few minutes to actually convince myself to do anything at all. I feel like collapsing into a fetal position and never crawling back up, but that would make things worse. 

I always seem to be making things worse. I can’t do anything in this world without screwing up something else. It’s like I’m cursed or something. I’m like King Midas except everything I touch collapses instead of turning into gold. Sometimes I wish I could just stop doing the worst thing possible, but I always do. I always end up taking the worst path out of all the ones in front of me. I need a map to guide me, but I’d probably ruin that too.

Eventually I drag myself to the driver’s seat of the car, and try not to slam my head against the wheel. I don’t want to do this. I don’t really want to do anything. 

I kind of want to sleep, and not wake up, but I don’t really want to die. I want to still be living, but not really doing anything. A coma sounds nice, because then I can’t ruin things. Though I’d probably find a loophole and manage to make things worse.

~*~*~*~

When I walk up the front steps it seems too dark and quiet. The front door is held ajar with the screen still in place to keep bugs out, but it’s too dark for anyone to see me approach.

I walk closer to the front door, and hesitate a moment before pushing it in front of me and stepping inside. I hadn’t even realized how hot it was out there until the air conditioning hits me, and it feels wonderful.

The living room is extremely dark with the only light coming from the kitchen. Mikey looks to be unconscious on the couch having obviously cried a lot, with his head on Pete’s lap where he’s sitting next to him. 

Pete’s looking at his hands blankly until he hears the door creak. He looks up, and an expression flutters on his face that is so complex and varied that I can’t describe it. Pete shakes Mikey awake, and his head lifts lazily.

Mikey stands up almost instantly muttering an, “oh thank god.” 

He barely gets the words out before he runs up to me and swing his arms around me in a death grip. I barely see him before he’s wrapping his wiry body around my shoulders, and honestly it makes me feel a million times worse. I made him think I was dead. He’s been miserable for so long, and it’s my fault. 

Out of the corner of my eye I see Pete inching his way out of the room and I hate that I’m displacing him in his own home. It’s his house too, and I keep undermining that. Yet another thing I’ve royally fucked up.

“Mikey, I know you’re mad-”

“Shut the fuck up, you asshole!” Mikey says squeezing me tighter, and I sort of can’t breathe.

“Mikey I-”

“I’m not mad!” he says and he pulls away from me, but he keeps a firm grip on my arm. “I thought you were dead you dumb-fuck!”

“I know, and I’m sorry,” I answer grimly.

“You should be,” he states, “you had me picking out flowers!”

“I know Mikey, but I need to talk to you.”

“Yes you do,” he agrees.

“No, Mikey, I... I really have to talk to you,” I say.

Mikey nods, and he seems to understand that I’m asking him to sit down because he does, and I sit next to him on the couch. He looks more relieved than anything, but he has a lot of concern in his eyes which makes me feel my guilt levels rise infinitely. I have a cauldron of guilt boiling up in my stomach that makes me feel like the horrible person I know I am.

“Mikey I...” I take a deep breath trying to figure out how to phrase what I’m feeling, “there’s something wrong with me.”

“I know,” He says, trying to lighten the mood, but I’m not in a joking kind of mood.

“No, I mean really. I don’t know what it is, but there’s just something wrong with me. I keep getting sick and throwing up, and I’m always tired, and I can’t eat right, and always have a headache-“

“You’re stressed, Gerard! It happens.”

I sigh, and I finally just burst with what I think is really going on, “Mikey, I think I’m going insane.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Obviously he’s not insane, but he’s stuck in his own head so that’s what he sees.) I just wanted to clarify that, because it might have seemed out of place. And feel free to hate me for this chapter.
> 
> Also, I'm not having a good week, so can we not insult me? I doubt you would, but really now is not a good time to do it.


	15. Destination: Recovery.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first step is in admitting that you have a problem.

I’m trying to forget that the past few days ever happened. It’s not working. I remember every tiny detail of it. Every single second. Every footstep, every word, and every messed up emotion.

I remember the guilt when I kissed Frank. I remember the look in his eyes when I tried to drive away. He had been so angry at me. He had every right to be. I messed it up. I messed everything up. He was my friend and I messed that up. I have a habit of doing the worst possible thing that the situation permits. I hate that I’m always doing that, but who would I be if I weren’t ruining everything?

I remember hearing Mikey’s voice in the texts on my phone. I couldn’t even hear him, it was just words, but I heard him. I heard the desperation, and the fear, and it made me hate myself a million time more than I already did.

I remember the look on his face when I walked into the house like he was shrugging the weight of the world away. He also kind of wanted to punch me in the face. That would have been warranted.

I stare at my feet on the end of the couch, trying to pull myself away from the constant replay of events in my mind. I‘m not very good at it.

I only look up when I hear someone walking down the stairs. I look up to see Mikey stepping slowly, dresses smartly a little too early in the morning. It’s not early, but I didn’t get any sleep, so I feel like it is. I haven’t seen Pete or Mikey since the sun came out, which is unlike them. I’m supposed to be the vampire, not them.

Mikey walks over to the counter, and grabs his keys from the ugly, aging laminate. He then turns to me, and looks me over with an unreadable expression, before he breathes in long and hard.

Mikey says looking sad and tired, “Come on, Gerard. Get your coat we’re going on a road trip.”

“A what? Why? Where?”

Mikey repeats, “A road trip. Because I said so. To a doctor.”

“Why though?” 

“Honestly?”

I groan, and answer sarcastically, “no lie to me.”

“It’s been too long, Gee. You’ve been sad too long, and you’re always being a fucking pessimist about everything.”

“So?”

“Well Gerard, Pete went through this too, and you know what that turned out to be,” Mikey says critically.

“You think I’m depressed?” It’s not so much a question as it is a statement.

“I think it’s a possibility. I’m not willing to risk what happens if you are, and don’t get help for it.”

“Why would uh,” I clear my throat, “Why would you think that?”

“If you could only see yourself, Gerard,” Mikey says shaking his head, “I’m really worried about you. I don’t want you to go through what happened last time.”

“Last time was different,” I say.

“Yeah you’re right, it _was_ different. Because this time everything is ten times worse.”

I frown, “but why do I need help? I’m fine.”

“No you’re fucking not,” he replies, “I have to force you to eat food half the time, and that scares me shitless, okay? You should eat.”

“I have been eating!”

Mikey groans, “yeah, but not as much as you really should. You’re also just look miserable whenever I look at you nowadays, and it’s really getting old. It’s not okay for you to always be sad. That’s not normal, Gerard. Maybe in variety it wouldn’t be something to bad an eyelash at, but the fact that you haven’t fucking smiled in forever is scary. The only time you ever even laugh anymore is when Frank’s around, and that scares me even more, because you’re adamant of your heterosexuality.”

“I don’t want to talk about him,” I reply, looking down.

“I can see that, but you’re gonna have to talk to someone. Gerard, I don’t know if you’re going through a sexuality crisis, if you’re still hung up over that girl, or if you’re just in a bad place, but it’s not okay anymore. There’s a grace period where it’s okay to be sad and hung up on a breakup, but that period has long since passed. I don’t want to risk you doing something bad to yourself again,” Mikey says.

“It was one time. The other night was a mistake.”

“It could happen again, and if you threw away that many years sober just to start up again then I will never forgive you. Never.”

I groan, “But Frank-”

“Yeah, what happened sucks. You came onto him, and he pushed you away, sorry. What do you want me to say? Do you want the truth?”

“The truth would be nice,” I reply.

“Well the truth is that Frank absolutely did the right thing. I want to give him a high five and a pat on the back, because he didn’t take advantage of the thought-he-was-straight-guy-who’s-reevaluating-his-sexuality. If he had, I’d have kicked him in the fucking balls. Gerard, you’re vulnerable as all hell right now, and if he had prayed on that, he wouldn’t be as good a person as I know him to be. Maybe if you still like him in a month, things will be different, but right now you’re confused, and you don’t know what the hell you’re doing.”

“Are you saying I _don’t_ like him?” I ask.

“I’m saying you might, but now’s not a good time to be thinking about a relationship. Right now, you have to put yourself first. If, after you’ve cleared your head up a little, you still want to go for something with Frank, and he does to, than I say that’s fine. Now though, no. I’m putting my own foot down. I can’t lose you, Gerard,” Mikey says.

“You won’t,” I say, feeling guilt seep into my bones like a cold shower.

“I almost did last night. You lost yourself a few years ago, and that might as well have been it for you, but you got out of that. That was pretty brave of you, and I commend you for it, but right now, I’m far past disappointed. I’m so disappointed you wouldn’t even believe it. You pulled yourself up, and now you’re falling back down. I’m trying to offer you a ladder to climb yourself out, but it’s only going to help if you decide to hold a rung and climb for your life.”

“I don’t... I don’t need any-”

Mikey scoffs and gives me the most frustrated look he is humanly capable of making and says, “You’re not going to get better until you admit you’re messed up. You are though, and I mean that in the most loving way I can, because I can’t stand seeing you so miserable. You’re messed up, and until you own up to that, things are going to keep getting worse.”

“Mikey, I don’t want to be a loser who sits in one of those dark therapist rooms, and talks about their feelings,” I say.

“Then don’t be that person, and let yourself and everyone around you down. Be that person who’s so selfish and desperate to be depressed that you ruin everything and everyone. Be the person who chases a bottle of sleeping pills with a bottle of vodka, or steps in front of a train and ruins everyone else’s life along the way. If you get to be the one who ruins your life, why don’t you get to be the one who ruins everyone else’s, right? Be that person, Gerard. If you want to, be him. Be that guy. Be the one with the overly large picture standing on an abysmally boring pedestal, with an equally abysmal eulogy that pisses off everyone in the fucking church. Be that person, Gerard. Why would I care? Why? You’re just my brother, why would I care if you ruined your life? You’re just my best friend, why would I care if you died? You’re just stupid Gerard, why would I give a fuck if you let the demons win?”

“Mikey, I’m not going to kill myself,” I try to say, but Mikey just gives me this livid look.

“You also weren’t going to drink again, but look at how good you are at keeping your word?” He says, and that’s like a big blow to the gut. I probably wouldn’t hurt this much if he hit me in the head with a cinderblock. 

“I don’t want to be that guy, Mikes.”

“Then suck it up and admit you’re not as perfect as you try to be. You need to either give in and realize you’re breaking, or you have to sit it out and wait for you to be too broken to fix. I don’t want you to break, Gerard, but the path you’re going down only leads to one thing. You’re not getting better by pretending you’re fine, because we both know you’re not,” Mikey says, “face it bro. You’re sick in the head right now, or you’re on the verge of being so. It’s getting kind of out of hand.”

“Well I mean, I can’t exactly help it. I can’t just stop and magically be happy because you want me to. That’s not the way the world works, Mikes.”

“No, you’re right. I’m not asking you to magically get better though. I’m not asking you to get zapped by a magic wand and turn to some happy lovey-dovey cartoon character. I’m asking you to look in a fucking mirror and see that something is wrong,” Mikey replies.

“But I’m... I’m fine.”

“A person who is fine doesn’t worry that they’re going insane,” Mikey replies. I have to admit it though, he’s got me there. I can’t really rebuttal that one.

“It was a bad day,” I try.

“Gerard, that was yesterday,” Mikey says sternly.

“But it was a bad day, and I made it through it,” I reply, because one day can be a big battle if your head makes it one.

“The bad can’t go away overnight. I don’t know precisely what happened between you and Frank. All I got was a hasty explanation from him, and I’m just really glad he didn’t do anything, Gerard. I don’t know how much worse off you’d be if he had.”

I frown, because I was kind of thinking I’d be better off. I had thought it was the rejection in the first place that made me sad, but apparently Mikey’s got other ideas. I don’t know when, and I don’t know why, but for some reason, Mikey seems to know more about me than I do myself. It’s kind of scary to be at odds with yourself, and it’s worse to fight internally without causation. Maybe it would be an easier fight to win, if I knew what side to take. Maybe I wouldn’t be in the mess if I knew even the smallest thing about myself.

“There’s no shame in admitting you need help. Everyone needs help every now and again. The cowardly thing to do is to deny it though. It makes you no stronger to fall by yourself, than to stand up with someone’s help.”

“You sound like a fucking inspirational speaker that gets invited to high schools, and makes the entire room fall asleep,” I reply.

“I’m glad to hear that you have retained your cynicism.”

“I am a cynic at heart, no matter what skin I wear,” I respond.

“You’re trying to steer off the point. You need to make up your mind whether you want to just drown yourself in self-pity, or get up and fucking do something about it. I don’t care if you’re mentally sick, or if you’re just really depressed at the moment. I don’t care. Okay? I don’t care what’s wrong, I just care that you try to get help with whatever it is,” Mikey states.

I look up at him and ask, “But what if something is really wrong with me?”

“Then you learn to live with whatever it is, and get better. I doubt it’s anything that you can’t work hard to fix though. You’re not a bad person, Gerard. You really aren’t. You’re just a bit muddled, and that’s okay. Everyone gets lost. Life doesn’t come with a map, and a step by step instruction guide. Besides, that would be no fun,” Mikey tells me.

He walks over to the kitchen counter and throws his keys onto it with a clang. I try not to look at him, but I can feel his eyes looking into me. I can feel him pitying me, and I hate it. I don’t like being pitied, it makes me feel gross. Like all I need is a shower.

“I’m not going to force you to do anything, Gerard. I’m just telling you that I care about you, and you’re caught up in the middle of all this which means that you can’t take a step back and look at yourself. You can’t look at this situation with a pair of fresh eyes, but if you could, you’d see what I see. You’d see a guy who’s starving himself, puking every other day, crying himself to sleep, who’s letting his eyes sink so far into his head that museums try to put him on display in an Egyptian mummy exhibit. You might not see those things as big as they are, but when it’s all together, it’s pretty obvious that something went wrong. So what do we do when something goes wrong? Throw it away and let it die? Or do you want to see what there is to do to make things better?”

I sigh, because Mikey isn’t going to give up on this one. He looks far too set in his position to give up on it. Also it doesn’t help that he’s right, and I’m being an idiot.

“I guess I should try to help myself get better.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I think that it's time to let Gerard get better.


	16. Objective: I Don't Know

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You know it's been a long time when you're time lapse isn't as long as it took for you to write the chapter.

“I don’t mean to point out the obvious or anything, well actually, I do, that’s why I’m talking in the first place, but anyway, I can’t seem to overlook the fact that you haven’t talked to Frank in over a month,” Pete says, looking at me critically.

“Well yeah,” I shrug, “but what does that matter?”

“Well it matters because Mikey’s not letting him come over to the house at all, and he is my friend too, Gerard. I’m not saying he’s more important, or that I think you’re moving too slowly or anything, I’m just curious. When is going to be the right time to let him back into your life?”

“I don’t know,” I reply.

“That helps, thanks,” Pete says sarcastically.

“I don’t okay? I just don’t know. Maybe soon, maybe never. All I know is that right now, I have to focus on myself, not anyone else. I’m trying to not fall apart right now, Pete. Frank isn’t exactly going to help me with that.”

“You liked him.”

“I don’t know if I did. I don’t know if I do. I don’t know if my brain wasn’t just so fucked up that it decided to attach itself to the first person who was nice to me. Because, maybe that’s the only reason I ever liked him. Maybe that’s it. Maybe I just saw the opportunity and I was like ‘fuck it’ and decided I liked him. But I don’t know. I don’t like boys, Pete. I never have. That’s not some part of me that I’m hiding, or that I’m afraid of. I’m not questioning, I’m not confused, I’m not anything. It’s just Frank.”

“But what does he mean to you when you refuse to see him at all?” Pete asks, “I’ve been talking to him and he thinks you hate him!”

“I don’t hate him! Why would he think I hate him?”

“Probably because you ran away from him and haven’t talked to him since,” Pete said, “right after you tried to kiss him.”

“Don’t bring it up,” I answer, putting my head on the counter.

“Sorry.”

“I’m not mad,” I say, “I just don’t want to talk about what happened with him to you, Pete. No offense, but there’s really only one person who I’d talk about that with.”

“Mikey?”

“Absolutely not. Mikey’s my brother,” I say, “No, I would only talk about that with Frank.”

~*~*~*~

I find myself in the ruined park again. Just kind of sitting, and looking. Not doing anything. I guess I just needed to be away from Pete and Mikey for a little while. Not that I don’t like them, or don’t appreciate them, but sometimes, you get tired of the same people. Sometimes you just need a change.

The sky is overcast, and the air is starting to get colder, but it’s not too bad. It’s not that noticeable, but it makes the shadows of everything seem a little more menacing without the sun. The sky is just a bright dazzling grey with no sign of the sun. It’s my favorite kind of sky though.

The air smells like leaves and dirt. It’s not a bad smell, just overly earthy because it’s not polluted by anything manmade. No smell of gasoline, or even something small like the smell of someone cooking food. Just simple.

“A little birdy told me to kick you in the balls if I ever saw you trying to get yourself drunk,” a voice says and I turn to see Frank looking over at me, leaning against a tree.

“I’m not drinking,” I reply, and hold up the bottle to show him, “it’s fucking soda.”

“What _are_ you doing?”

“I’m just sort of... sitting,” I answer. I’m not sure I anticipated Frank to be here, but I guess that kind of makes sense. Of course he’d be the other person who knows about this place. No one in forever has found it so the new guy in town is more logical than someone who’s lived here longer than I have.

“Mind if I sit too?”

“I guess,” I sigh.

“Do you not want me to? I won’t sit down if you don’t want me to. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, Gerard,” Frank says.

“I don’t care, really,” I say.

Frank shrugs and I see him walk over to me, before he sits next to me, against the basketball hoop. I look at him and he looks back at me, but then he looks down at the ground.

“So I don’t really know how to initiate conversation,” Frank says.

“You don’t have to talk, you know.”

“Okay?”

“Well I mean, this place doesn’t belong to us. To people. This is just nature really. You can let them talk,” I say.

“Well people must’ve been here. Otherwise there wouldn’t be an unfinished park here. Unless the animal kingdom is much more sophisticated than I gave them credit for,” Frank says.

“No, nature took it away from people. It’s the mosquitoes, they didn’t appreciate us trying to steal this little part of land so they made sure it was never finished. They fought valiantly, who am I to take it back from them?”

“You’re talking like it was some big war or something. With knights and swords.”

I sigh, “I don’t see what the difference would be. We still lost.”

“Do you hate me?” Frank asks, which is exceedingly off-topic.

“No.”

“That’s all you’re gonna say? ‘No’?”

“I don’t hate you,” I say.

“Okay,” Frank says, looking hesitant and confused, “so why have you been avoiding me? Well, avoiding would make it out to seem like you gave yourself the opportunity to see me, but chose not to, you just haven’t even tried to talk to me in a month. You’ve been ignoring me.”

“It’s not about you right now,” I say, looking across the cement at a tree on the other side.

“What?”

“It’s not about you right now, Frank. I’m not arrogant when I say that, right now, it’s about me. My life isn’t about you, it’s not about making you happy, it’s not about making sure you know I’m not mad at you, it’s about me. It’s my life. I’ve spent all of it so far trying to cater to other people, trying to be someone that other people can hang out with. More than twenty years of just putting everyone else first. I’m trying out a new thing where I actually live for myself. Live for me. Not for Mikey, or you, or anyone really. I just want to be me. For once.”

Frank nods slowly and looks at me, “so you don’t want to talk to me?”

“I didn’t say that,” I respond, “I don’t know what I want, if anything, from you Frank. I think I just need to know you’re okay for now. That you’re not mad at me or anything, but that’s all I really know.”

“So do you want to just... forget what happened?” 

“No.”

“No?”

“No,” I confirm, “Because it did happen, Frank. I kissed you, and I shouldn’t have, but I did. I should deny it, blame it on the depression, but I did. That’s just true. No façades, no lying. So, like, I don’t want to pretend or forget, because than I’d just be lying.”

“So then what?” Frank asks.

“I told you. I don’t know.”

Frank sighs, “Well see, Gerard, and I don’t mean to say that you distancing yourself is a bad thing, or even weird, but I just, I guess, I miss you. I do, and I’m sorry if that upsets you or anything, but I do.”

“It doesn’t upset me.”

“Well good. But my point is that, for four weeks I’ve been hearing about you through Pete. Nothing all that detailed, just things like ‘Gerard’s still not ready to see you,’ and I get that. I mean, I don’t understand what’s going on in your head, but I get that you don’t want to see me, but that doesn’t change the fact that I miss you. Before all this shit happened, Gerard, I thought you were getting a little better. I’m no idiot, I knew part of you was broken, or breaking, but it felt like, for a little while, you had a little more color in your cheeks. A wider smile. I thought we were friends. I thought we were becoming really good friends, and then everything just sort of stopped.”

“I’m sorry,” I say.

“No, I’m not asking you to be sorry. I don’t want you to be sorry, you didn’t do anything wrong. It’s just me saying that, hey, Gerard, I miss you.”

“Well, I didn’t mean to isolate you. Actually, I guess that’s not true. Part of me has just been really scared that you would make me hate myself more. Make me just feel guilty for kissing you, and I’ve been so petrified of getting near you because of that.”

“Well do you? Do I have a bad effect on you? Right now?”

“Not that I know,” I reply, “I’ve kind of missed you too.”

“Well good,” Frank says, “because that puts us on an even playing field.”

“Yeah,” I say, and look at him for the first time since he sat down. “Frank, I still don’t know who I am. What I am. I don’t know. I need you to respect that.”

“I do,” Frank says.

“Good.”

“And I need you to respect that whatever you are, I don’t hate you. If you figure it out for yourself, I may even like you.”

“What?”

Frank shrugs, “just, I mean. I might. You know, maybe.”

“What’s changed?”

“Well when you kissed me you gave me like a minute to think about it. I’ve had a month now, that’s enough time for me to figure things out.”

“It’s not enough time for me,” I admit, “I’m not even kind of sure what I’m doing yet.”

“That’s okay,” Frank says, “I’m not in any hurry.”

“I wouldn’t wait for me if I were you.”

“Who said I’m waiting?” Frank says, “Maybe I just wanna sit in an abandoned park with you.”

“Do you?”

Frank looks at me and smiles, “Well Gerard, I’m in the same state of mind as you are right now. I don’t know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long. This fic is hard to write for me, because I have trouble just sitting down and actually writing it. I'm trying, I promise.


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